Of Choices and Miracles
by Tiara of Sapphires
Summary: This war took and took and took. Cassian just wanted something back. Cassian/Jyn RebelCaptain Fix-it. ROGUE ONE SPOILERS
1. Chapter 1

**Forgive the deus ex machina but…I need at least part of a goddamn fix-it okay? Leave me aloooone.**

 **Enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars or its characters. I just like to mend my wounds with fic.**

…

Cassian raced through the halls of the Citadel. At least, he liked to think he was racing. It probably looked more like limping or stumbling.

The Stormtroopers had poured outside, so there was little resistance between him and…whatever he was looking for. His uniform gave him some cover. It was too chaotic for them to be searching for two intruders in Imperial uniform.

Transport. They needed transport.

He knew that Jyn could finish the job. That was fact now.

Jyn was capable, driven. On top of a thousand other things that made him so glad to have known her.

Force, his injuries were getting to him.

The layouts of the Citadel they had stolen a while back said that there were several hangars. Most of them were for TIE fighters, but he needed a shuttle. Preferably one with a hyperdrive or they weren't going to get very far.

And there it was, in a small hangar. Hope. Hope in the form of a parked starship.

It was small, big enough for the two of them.

They couldn't afford to wait for anyone else. His heart ached for Baze and Chirrut and Bodhi. Maybe they could find a way off Scarif.

The mission came first, their lives second. Every single one of them knew that this was the price before embarking on the mission. Death was the most likely outcome.

Cassian knew how to make hard choices. He knew how to make sacrifices. He sacrificed his soul to the cause, his life if it came to it.

But if luck, fate, the Force, could get him and Jyn out of this after the mission was over, it would be worth it.

The ship's engine roared to life and lifted off the ground.

Cassian tried not to think about how if Jyn were anyone else, he would have left them behind. Hell, he'd probably kill them just so the secrets stayed hidden. If she was captured and interrogated by the Empire, it could bring down the Rebellion.

But, if he got her out of there, there was no need to worry.

He picked that as his justification for going back for her.

He blasted out of the hangar doors and looped around the base, keeping an eye on the figure atop the tower.

The dogfight was quickly being lost to the Rebellion and he had to hope a stray shot didn't blow him out of the sky.

The ship idled near the small bridge extending out from the main dish and he lowered the ramp.

Cassian flung himself out of the pilot's seat, wincing. He needed medical attention, but there was no time for that.

"Jyn!" he yelled as soon as he saw her.

Jyn lowered her raised blaster and her face broke into a smile.

"Did you do it?" Cassian asked, almost rhetorically.

The smile morphed into something that looked almost angry.

"Of course I did!" Jyn screeched, sounding half-manic.

Relief almost crushed Cassian right then and there. They did it. No matter what happened then, they did it. The mission was a success.

"Get on!" Cassian yelled, turning back to the front of the ship. He kept glancing back, making sure Jyn was following him.

They were so close. All he wanted was this one thing to go right. Everywhere he went, things never went according to plan. He had to settle with so many half-victories. All of these pieces of his soul ripped out of him with every kill. Those he personally committed, those that were collateral.

The ends always justified the means. He told himself that. It usually helped him sleep at night.

Just this one thing. Let this one thing work.

He watched as Jyn limped, looking just as bad as he probably did, to the edge of the railing. And with a jump, she was on board.

Relief came again. Okay, now they just needed to get out of the system and go into hyperspace. Easy.

And then there was movement, a familiar flash of white and the sound of a blaster firing.

He watched as the bolt connected with her shoulder. She went down with a shout, almost slipping out the back of the ship.

"No!" Cassian yelled.

Jyn's fingers curled into the ship's floor, keeping her from slipping out. She was groaning, and that meant she was still alive.

Cassian closed the ramp as he pulled away, resisting the urge to make another run around the tower and blow the Imperial bastard to bits.

Dammit, Cassian wasn't fast enough. If he had been faster, Jyn wouldn't have been shot.

But they needed to get off of the surface of Scarif, avoid everyone they see, and make the jump to hyperspace.

And then they needed to get to a neutral or friendly world, patch their wounds, and rendezvous with the Rebellion.

It was all easier said than done.

But in the end, they did all they could. They completed the mission. Now they had to make sure they lived to see another day. Live to fight another day.

Cassian didn't need to leave the planet's atmosphere to know that it was chaos. The Rebellion and Empire clashed, the planetary shield generator in ruins.

He just needed to dodge everything, hope that the Rebellion didn't mistake them for the enemy, hope the Empire didn't catch on that the occupants of this ship were not Imperial agents.

"Rebellions are built on hope," he muttered.

Jyn was shuffling behind him, maybe getting to her feet, but he didn't dare look away from the controls.

He was a good pilot. And he needed to make sure that they got out of there.

He didn't look back as a green beam descended from the sky and impacted with the surface of the planet.

The Death Star. Of course, the Empire would try to stop them by utterly destroying everything. At least that meant that the Imperial who shot Jyn would likely die in the blast.

That would help him sleep at night.

The chaos of the battle was worse up close.

There were ships, pieces of ships, friend and enemy. And he had to consider that they were all enemies. On an Imperial ship, he was enemy to the Rebellion. And he didn't know if the Empire knew that this ship was commandeered by the Rebellion.

Cassian pulled left, barely missing the blast from an X-wing.

"Force," Jyn hissed behind him. It was probably out of pain but also out of the fact that they were almost blown to bits.

"Come on. Come on," Cassian breathed.

He wanted to help. He wanted to turn back and help the Alliance with the battle. But he had to make a choice. The mission was over and they had to get out of the system.

People were dying. People died in this battle. People he knew and didn't know.

His hands were firm, his jaw tense.

And he made the choice.

Finally, finally, they were in clear space, but time was running out before someone got a lucky shot.

Cassian had to make a choice and quick, because of all he knew, Jyn was dying a few feet away from him.

This was an Imperial ship. They couldn't go back to Yavin. The Empire would be able to track them. And the Rebellion would likely shoot them on sight anyway before they could send a transmission explaining themselves.

His hands fumbled at the controls, finding a set of coordinates.

And they jumped into hyperspace.

…

 **Remember that TIE fighter in the fucking trailers? This is a play off of that. Chapter 2 should be coming soon, but it will come sooner if there are lots of reviews ;)**

 **All feedback is appreciated!**

 **Cheers!**

 **~Tiara of Sapphires**


	2. Chapter 2

**Thank you all** _ **so**_ **much for the feedback! It's all really appreciated!**

 **By the way, I made some edits on Chapter 1 (if you read before 12/22). Because reasons. Feel free to read them if you want.**

 **Enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars or its characters. I just like to mend my wounds with fic…**

…

When there was pounding and shouting at the door of Cassian's childhood home, his mother had shoved him under the bed with orders to be quiet.

"Not a sound, chiquitito," she told him. Her voice didn't shake, but Cassian could see the worry in her dark eyes.

His parents had been very worried recently. They didn't talk about what was wrong around him, but he would sometimes catch words like 'war' and 'Empire' and 'occupation'.

So, he nodded and did what she said.

Cassian was small enough to easily fit under the bed and he tucked himself into the far corner, clutching his toy speeder to his chest. It had only been a few days after his birthday. His parents bought him sweets and a shiny green toy speeder in celebration.

He was getting big. His father loved to say that.

"Look at my boy!" he would say, groaning theatrically as he hoisted Cassian into the air.

While Cassian hid, the front door creaked open and there were voices.

What happened next, his memory was a little fuzzy on. People told him that because he was young. His brain did something to block some of the memories. A survival technique.

Cassian was always skeptical about that.

He remembered yelling and blaster fire. His father died silently. But his mother screamed and screamed and screamed. There was another sound of a blaster firing and the screaming stopped.

Cassian didn't look from his hiding spot and didn't uncover his ears. He didn't cry or make a noise.

Whoever was at the door, whoever shot his parents spoke to each other in strangely mechanical voices.

There was silence afterwards, for a few moments. Cassian didn't move the entire time.

Then, there was a crackling and popping sound. Then, Cassian smelled smoke, burning in his nose.

Fire. They set the house on fire.

He crawled out from under the bed to see flames eating at the front of the house and at the two motionless figures on the floor.

Shock froze him in place and fear unfroze him. He needed to run. He needed to _leave_. But Mama and Papa weren't going to leave with him.

Cassian scrambled out the back door. He ran and ran, tears and soot covering his face. He heard screaming and blasters firing behind him.

He didn't turn around until he was surrounded by trees. By then, he could only see the faint glow of red against the night sky.

It was luck that the Rebellion found him the next day. He slept in the forest that night, curled up in a nook in a tree.

They took him in. Told him that the Empire killed his parents and destroyed the town. Cassian had nowhere else to go, so he stayed. And he became.

What he became exactly depends on who one would ask. The Empire would call him a traitor. The Rebellion would call him a hero.

But with Jyn slumped on the floor of the Imperial ship he stole, he didn't feel very heroic.

"Jyn," he whispered, kneeling down next to her, easing her into a seated position.

Her face was pale and sweaty, her head lolling to the side.

"We did it," she breathed.

Cassian brushed a few errant strands of hair away from her face.

"We just have to hope someone was listening," he said.

With what he saw on the way out of Scarif, he needed to force himself to have hope.

Jyn only nodded, eyes flickering open and shut, open and shut.

"They were. I have a feeling."

She was probably right.

"Did—did anyone else make it out?"

Cassian delayed answering by shucking off his uniform jacket. His entire torso didn't appreciate the movement. He could only imagine what kind of mess of fractured bones and bruises lay underneath his clothes.

And the pain must've been apparent on his face, because Jyn reached for him. At least it distracted her from the question he didn't have an answer for.

"You're injured."

Cassian caught her hand and set it back in her lap.

"So are you."

He was injured, yes. But he would deal with that later. Jyn was his priority.

Cassian gripped her shoulders and leaned her forward. Her hand flew out to grab at his knee as she hissed in pain.

What he saw was definitely not what he wanted to see: a charred hole spread over her shoulder blade.

"Thought I killed the bastard. Didn't kill him hard enough," she muttered.

She sounded coherent, which was a good sign. If she was unconscious, then he'd have to panic. He was panicking anyway.

"Who?" Cassian asked.

"Krennic. He tried to stop me, but I shot him. Should've shot him a couple more times."

That brought a fresh wave of guilt. Cassian should've been faster, better.

"I didn't see him up there," he muttered. "I should have. I could've stopped this."

Jyn shook her head.

"It's not your fault."

Cassian undid the buttons of her vest. His fingers were shaking, fumbling.

"It's _his_ damn fault," Jyn snapped. "He took everything from me. _And_ he almost killed you."

Her expression crumpled before his eyes.

"You almost died," she repeated, like she had forgotten.

He _did_ fall. It was either fall or take a blaster to the chest. She must have not seen him get up and run.

In a way, Cassian was thankful that Krennic did almost kill him. If he hadn't, sure, Cassian and Jyn both would've gotten to the top of the tower, but would've had nowhere to go from there.

"But I'm here now. I made it out." Cassian said, "We both did."

He couldn't say that they were safe until they got back to the base. Or until the Death Star was destroyed. Or until the Empire had fallen.

So, they'll never be safe. Not for a long time.

"Thank the Force for that," Jyn murmured.

He eased the cloth off of her, apologizing softly every time she hissed in pain. She was going to be fine. He had to believe that she was going to be fine.

Now for her shirt. More buttons. And more pain for her.

"Damn it all," Cassian hissed.

He went through his pockets and pulled out a vibroblade.

"Hold still," he said.

He ran the knife up the front of her shirt, shredding the fabric. He cut the shirt off in pieces. It revealed an array of cuts and bruises, but nothing as bad as the wound on her shoulder.

The shirt came off easily until a piece of it wouldn't come off. Until he pulled and Jyn gasped in pain.

He looked to see that the cloth over the blaster wound had burned and stuck to her skin. Every time he pulled at it...It wasn't coming off gently and painlessly.

"Jyn," her name left his mouth weakly.

He had to…he had to…Force save him

"Jyn, I have to get the rest of this off of you. But it's burned to your skin so I'm going to have to tear it off. Okay?"

She stiffened in his arms.

"That's gonna hurt," she said: a statement, not a question.

"Yeah."

She shuddered and Cassian's heart broke a little.

"Okay. Do it."

Cassian didn't like how tense she was. She was pulled taut, vibrating with pain and nervousness. His fault, of course. Not only could he not get her off of Scarif unharmed, he couldn't manage to be a passable medic.

"Jyn, hold my hand," Cassian said.

He collected the fabric in one hand and Jyn's hand in the other. Her hands were rough like his, a testament of a hard life.

The hum of the hyperdrive and their breathing filled the cockpit.

This was going to hurt and Cassian already wanted to be sick at the idea of it. It smelled like burnt flesh and hair and cloth and he didn't do anything yet.

He counted down from three in his head. She squeezed his hand and he squeezed back. She had enough bravery and courage for the two of them.

And then he yanked.

Jyn's screech _almost_ overcame the sound of cloth and flesh ripping away from each other. Cassian swallowed back bile and held Jyn close.

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry, gods, Force, Jyn, I'm sorry," Cassian chanted. Words weren't going to undo what he did or stop the pain, but he hoped at least Jyn would understand that he was so goddamn sorry. For everything.

Jyn breathed wetly into his shoulder as shame burned his face. His fault. Again, it was his fault.

"It's okay. I'm okay," Jyn whispered, even though it was clear she wasn't okay.

Cassian looked down the plane of her back to see his work.

An ugly starburst of black and red. Because he wasn't fast enough. Because he was so unobservant that he didn't see Krennic coming.

"There should be some bacta somewhere," Cassian muttered.

Unless the Empire cared that little about their potentially wounded soldiers that they wouldn't bother providing a medical kit.

His hands were still shaking. If he never heard that pained noise out of Jyn for the rest of his life, he'd be a happy man.

The medical kit was well-hidden, but fully-stocked.

Cassian poured bacta onto the wound. He watched as a shiver ran through her as the goo dripped onto her skin and he outright _refused_ to think about how this could've looked intimate. They were close, practically on top of each other and Jyn was almost topless.

But she was also injured and it was his fault and he was playing medic so the thoughts came to a halt then.

He set a patch to seal it and put a little space between them.

"Feels funny," she muttered.

Cassian didn't dignify that with a response as he looked through the rest of the medical kit.

Two syringes of anesthetic. One for her, one for him. If there had been only one, he would've given it to her, of course. But, since it felt like his bones were shifting every time he moved, a grating sort of pain, he was quick to use it. He imagined the amount of bruising under his clothes.

If he was back at the Rebel base, he would've been dunked in a bacta tank, maybe both of them. A day, maybe only a few hours, and all would be fixed.

Cassian looked back at Jyn's face. Her eyes were closed and panic clutched his chest.

"Jyn! Come on, stay with me."

He tapped the side of her face, making her start a little.

Jyn slurred, "M' awake. Cold."

Damn it. If that was shock setting in, she was in trouble. Cassian pulled out a blanket—rough, grey, Imperial-issued—from another compartment.

"You know…" Jyn started, only to trail off.

She watched him, but her mind seemed like it was miles away. Cassian tucked the blanket around her, keeping from touching the bacta patch.

"I know what?" Cassian asked.

That seemed to kick her mind back into whatever conversation they were trying to have. Jyn smiled, half-awake. "You got that—that _crease_ between your eyes. It's kinda adorable."

If she weren't so severely injured and if he hadn't just caused her extreme pain, Cassian would've been flustered. No, he still felt flustered even then.

"You're being ridiculous," he murmured.

Cassian skimmed his hand over her cheek before he thought better of it. And then he pulled away, catching himself.

He cleared his throat, standing slowly. "Get some rest. It'll be a while before we drop out of hyperspace."

Jyn scoffed. "You too. You look worse than me and that's sayin' something."

What a pain in the ass. But he supposed became _his_ pain in the ass the moment they met.

Cassian nodded, smiling tightly until her eyes closed.

His smile slid from his face the moment her breath evened out. He had no intention of resting until they were on solid ground. Instead, he sat down on the pilot's seat.

When he didn't stare at the ship's dashboard, he stared at her.

He checked her pulse every once in a while. Maybe more often than was really necessary. Just to make sure she was still alive.

Time blended into a smear. Jyn, ship, pain. Jyn, ship, pain. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.

…

 **Ahh nothing like a tragic backstory.**

 **All feedback is appreciated!**

 **Feel free to drop in and say hi on Tumblr! I'm tiaraofsapphires on there!**

 **Cheers!**

 **~Tiara of Sapphires**


	3. Chapter 3

**Aaaah thank you all so much for the lovely feedback I got for the most recent chapter! It really warms the cockles of my heart. Especially after this hard time for the Star Wars fandom.**

 **Enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars or its characters. I just like to mend my wounds with fic…**

…

Lyra Erso believed in the Force.

During the too short time Jyn lived with her mother, that much was clear.

The private study Lyra had on Coruscant was always filled with tomes that weighed as much as Jyn, in languages Jyn didn't understand.

They were technically illegal, but because she was wife of Galen Erso, she got away with it. Not even the Emperor would be so foolish to malign the man who was bringing him closer and closer to absolute power.

And once the Ersos had escaped the Empire, it didn't matter that what she was researching was illegal. Their existence was illegal at that point.

In the quiet, Lyra would explain things to Jyn, bringing the large abstract to something a child could understand. An energy that defied time and space and death. Big, bigger than any one thing in the galaxy.

The ultimate lesson came when Lyra tied the clear kyber crystal around Jyn's neck and told her to trust in the Force.

That trust didn't save Lyra from the Deathtrooper's blaster.

Jyn tried not to think about the Force or death when she was finishing the mission. They were abstracts, a likely inevitability. Fear of death couldn't stop her, even though she was fully expecting to die at some point during the mission. Before it was done, maybe after.

She would die and then…what?

An eternal nothingness? Or some kind of afterlife?

In Jyn's dream, death was a beach.

Her limbs were lead and she was on her knees, unable to move. Sand and water seeped into her clothes, chilling her. She watched as the Death Star fired in the distance. A green beam ripped through the sky and impacted.

It was like Jedha, only she couldn't get away. She just sat in the sand and watched as a blinding wave of light and water and rubble got closer and closer.

She dreamt of burning alone and forever.

Consciousness hit like an asteroid, soreness replacing burning.

"Shit," Jyn murmured.

Her hand came up to the stone hanging from her neck. The right side of her body hurt every time she moved. But this wasn't the first time something like this had happened to her.

The stone felt smooth under her thumb.

It wasn't the same as her mother's embrace, but she liked to think a piece of her mother's soul was tucked inside.

It might not have been the Force, but it felt close enough.

She looked over at the sound of a loud inhale and exhale.

Cassian had his back to her, but just seeing the top of his head brought a wave of relief. She remembered him worrying over her.

He tried to help, but that help physically hurt. Even half-unconscious by shock, she could tell that he wasn't a trained medic. He was sorry for every time he had to hurt her. That was some consolation.

Her shoulder felt a lot better, so he must've done something right with the bacta.

It was nice to know that at least there was one person alive who actually gave a damn about her.

"Cassian," she said. Her voice sounded hoarse to her ears.

He whipped around and his relief seemed to mirror hers.

"Jyn, you're awake!"

She nodded. Yeah, she was awake, for better or worse.

Jyn reached behind her and pushed herself to her feet. The wound on her back and a thousand smaller and unseen injuries screamed at her for doing so.

"Where are we going?"

They were still in hyperspace, but the controls were beeping like they were going to reach their destination soon.

"You shouldn't be up," Cassian said.

Jyn arched a brow.

How could he say that to her when he looked like he was one solid hit from collapsing?

"Where are we going?" she repeated.

Cassian sighed.

"Otrarvis."

She had heard of it before. A small planet in the Outer Rim: inhospitable mountain ranges full of ores with one huge city nestled at the heart.

She wasn't sure why Cassian would bring them there. It hardly counted as neutral space. But it wasn't Empire-controlled, either. They would find a strange sort of limbo there.

"We'll need to ditch the ship as soon as we land. Sell it to someone," Cassian said.

Jyn nodded. It was a smart plan. They needed to get as far away from this Imperial ship as possible, as soon as possible.

Cassian turned back to the controls. "We should be dropping out of hyperspace in a few minutes."

It felt like a dismissal, but she stepped closer to stand by the pilot's seat. It felt good to move, despite the pain. It felt like living. The glow of stars streaking across the viewport was too surreal. The pain made things real.

If Cassian was uncomfortable with her watching what he was doing, he was a master at disguising it.

And she did watch. His hands danced over the buttons and switches. But every once in a while, he would pause for a beat, as if he was expecting another set of hands to help him. And then he would jerk into action, remembering himself.

She remembered too.

"I'm sorry," Jyn croaked.

Cassian looked up at her, startled. She was shocked that the words escaped her mouth. She should've kept her mouth shut and not said anything.

"I'm sorry about Kaytoo," she continued.

Something tiny and broken shifted in Cassian's face, turning a hardened warrior into a forlorn boy, but he recovered quickly, once again turning his attention back to the controls.

"It's fine. Not your fault."

She couldn't say anything more. As much of a pain K-2SO was, she couldn't help but feel some measure of affection for him in the end. The droid was close to Cassian. They were practically made for each other. And now he was gone.

And what of Bodhi or Baze or Chirrut? She didn't know if they made it out, if anyone else made it out. She didn't know if the plans, if Project Stardust, the thing her father lived and died for, made it out of Scarif.

That was what scared her the most; she didn't know for sure if their sacrifice came to mean anything for the Rebellion.

"The Empire fired on the base on Scarif. The Death Star." Cassian's voice was flat and dull.

The floor tilted under Jyn's feet.

"What?"

"It's destroyed. We were lucky to get out of there when we did."

She had been too busy lying on the ground, blinking black spots from her vision, to notice. She barely noticed Cassian's frantic race to get them out of Scarif. She didn't even think to ask him to wait for the others or even be concerned about them.

If Cassian hadn't found the ship, they would've been on Scarif when the laser hit, with no way off of the planet.

They would've died. They should've died.

Of all the people in the galaxy, it had to be her to cheat death. There were plenty of people who should've lived in her place. But, the guilt would be dealt with later. In the silence of safety, she would deal with it.

Jyn was almost thrown into the console when they dropped out of hyperspace and air hissed through clenched teeth. Pain burst over her shoulder and sunk into her bones.

"You okay?" Cassian asked.

"I'm fine."

She wasn't about to admit that it hurt a little. It wasn't a stop-everything kind of pain and she wasn't going to slow down for something as small as a twinge.

It felt like forever as the mottled green and grey planet got closer and closer in the viewport. Slowly, the planet's features became clear.

Asymmetric snow-topped peaks and deep valleys cut and burrowed over the landscape. The central city, Otrarii, tucked itself between two large ranges. Buildings filled the large space, some even crawling up the mountainsides.

"Hopefully nobody shoots at us."

"This is an Imperial ship," Jyn mused, lightly. "I'm not all that hopeful."

Cassian glanced up at her. "Thanks for the vote of confidence."

She allowed her lips to twitch a little. "'Welcome."

He didn't fly over the center of the city, but rather started looking over the outskirts for somewhere promising to land. The first airfield didn't hail them, so they passed over. No point in trying to land where they were likely to be shot at.

Finally, the comm unit crackled to life with a terse " _Identify yourself_."

Jyn turned back to the hull while Cassian made up a story to garner a landing spot.

She grabbed the medic kit and whatever clothes she could find—not before easing a much-too-big shirt over her good shoulder—and shoved them in a bag.

A blaster pistol, some rations, a set of comlinks, and a small wallet containing 40 credits were also quickly stowed in the bag. If the Empire was good for something, it was good for having useful stuff lying around in case of emergency.

Because Force knew what they would encounter on Otrarvis.

She turned back to Cassian pulling away from the comm unit.

"We're in the clear."

The ship circled around, creeping towards a conspicuously empty spot among shuttles and cargo carriers.

"I was expecting a firefight," Jyn muttered.

"Used to being shot at?"

"You'd be surprised how many enemies Saw has— _had_."

Jyn flinched, unseen by Cassian. There were many things she didn't want to talk about, and one of them was her time in Saw's militia. The fear, the hunger, the loneliness. And she didn't want to be reminded of the fact that he was also dead. At least she knew his death for a fact.

The landing pad got closer and closer as acceptance hardened in Jyn's stomach. They couldn't fly around in hyperspace forever. It was too safe, too easy. They needed to disappear.

The ship landed and shuddered to a stop.

"I've cleared the logs. Let's go," Cassian said, turning his seat to face the back of the ship

His hands braced on the armrests and he stood, straightening. He immediately buckled forward. The pained grunt that escaped Cassian's mouth and the sudden pallor of his face almost stopped Jyn's heart.

She lunged forward to catch him, but he righted himself at the last second. He held a hand out, as if to keep her away. He was shaking almost imperceptibly and sweat shone on his temples and upper lip.

"You're really injured," Jyn whispered.

Cassian shook his head.

He gritted out, "I'm fine."

"No, you're not," Jyn insisted.

Force, he wasn't okay. He couldn't deflect and pretend that Jyn didn't see him struggle to stay upright. He was in pain and that much was obvious. They both were. But he took care of her. It was likely he didn't do the same for himself.

Damn him.

Cassian spat, fire in his eyes, "I said I'm fine."

"Cassian!"

"No!"

Jyn winced as Cassian's voice filled the cockpit.

"I'll deal with it later. We can't slow down for this. Okay?"

Now he left her with a decision: let him walk around—but clearly he was going to be leaning on her—in obvious pain or shake him—not-so gently—until he saw reason.

"Fine."

Jyn barreled on before he could even think he won the argument. Because he didn't.

"We are going to sell this craft to the first person who will bargain with us. We are going to get shelter somewhere, maybe a hotel in one of the backwater districts."

They could probably get twenty thousand credits for the ship. That would buy a room and an innkeeper's silence for plenty of time.

She stepped closer. She couldn't lean over him in an attempt to intimidate him, now that he was standing. He was too tall for that. But she got in his space, making sure he knew that she meant business.

"Then, you're going to a hospital and I _will_ drag you there myself if I have to. Understood?"

They were way too close to each other. She didn't realize how close they were until the last word left her mouth.

Cassian stared at her like she was an unsolvable problem and a panacean answer at the same time and, boy, did that bring her pause. She couldn't think of a single person who ever looked at her like that.

Cassian smelled like sweat and blaster oil and dirt. He smelled like a battle.

She didn't know what to do. Her eyes flickered over his face, looking for some sort of indication of what they were supposed to do. He didn't seem to know either.

"Understood," Cassian murmured.

Force, that should've been the end of it, but it wasn't. Neither of them moved, neither of them really breathed louder than necessary. The silence was fragile, laced with something familiar that Jyn couldn't-wouldn't-shouldn't name.

It felt like after they disembarked from Eadu, like in the Rebel hangar on Yavin, like sneaking around the Citadel, like the brief moment between her feet landing on the stolen ship and the blaster bolt searing through her shoulder.

 _Welcome home._

There was a sound of flesh hitting metal and a sharp yell. The moment shattered instantly, the two of them rearing away from each other.

"They sound impatient," Jyn mused.

Right. Otrarvis. Get rid of the ship. Find shelter. Find a hospital for Cassian.

No time for searching for imaginary things.

"Yeah."

He shuffled forward once, barely able to get one foot in front of the other.

Force take it, this man's pride was going to make their lives _way_ more difficult.

"Lean on me," Jyn said.

It wasn't a request or a suggestion and she made sure that he couldn't interpret it as such. She stood, her side flush against his, telling herself this was the way to get them moving as fast as possible. She wrapped a hand around his waist and after a beat, his arm swung across her shoulders.

He was large and warm pressed against her, but also heavy. Each step had him leaning on her, gasping and hissing in pain.

"You're going to a hospital."

"Yeah, yeah."

…

 **And the plot starts rolling!**

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 **~Tiara of Sapphires**


	4. Chapter 4

**! all that lovely feedback!**

 **Sorry this was REALLY late but school started up and also the thing between my ears refused to cooperate.**

 **Enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars or its characters. I just like to mend my wounds with fic…**

…

Each step was a reminder that Cassian almost died trying to climb up that tower.

Krennic never got a shot on him, but he fell. He fell and Jyn watched him fall and hit one support beam, another support beam, on the way down. She could hear flesh and bone on metal with each hit and she had to swallow down bile at the sound. It was the kind of sound that she knew would come back in her dreams.

The worst part of it was the fact that she couldn't help him. He had told her to keep going before he fell and she did. She didn't look back down where he lay so far away from her. She told herself he was dead. It was the only way she could keep going. There was grief, hard and cold in her stomach.

And then he was alive and in a ship to rescue her. He should have just left and left her to die. The plans were already transmitted to the Rebel fleet. The mission was over and he didn't need her anymore. But he came back for her. He came back for her, got them away from Scarif, and fixed her when Krennic shot her.

And now he was barely able to walk under his own power.

He was injured, maybe even dying, and it was her fault.

They should've climbed faster. Cassian wouldn't have fallen if they had. She should've multitasked and taken down Krennic while Cassian took care of the Deathtroopers. She should've found a way to kill Krennic on Eadu. She should've saved Papa on Eadu so they wouldn't have had to go to Scarif in the first place.

Force help her, she didn't deserve to be the one able to walk

Jyn immediately tensed when she saw the man at the bottom of the ramp. His armor was Mandolorian, silver and green, as were the pistols on his hips.

Saw's militia had their run-ins with them before, Death Watch, specifically. None of them ended well.

"Fleeing the Empire, eh?" he greeted. His accent confirmed Jyn's suspicion: he was Mandolorian. His hand was on the butt of the pistol at his hip, betraying the cheer that was in his voice. Obviously, he didn't fully believe whatever story Cassian tried to sell him. It might not have been that coherent of a story to begin with.

"That's right," Jyn said, bravado into her voice that sounded hollow even to her ears. She figured keeping him impressed would be best. Make sure he knew that they were serious, not to be messed with or taken advantage of. Jyn could fight if this man or someone else turned on them—in theory, of course—but Cassian likely couldn't.

And she needed to protect him, now.

The Mandolorian whistled lowly.

"And on an Imperial ship? You must have some real balls to pull that off."

Jyn shrugged as well as she could with Cassian half-slumped over her. She could only hope that he didn't ask for a full retelling of what happened, because the first half of their getaway was lost to her.

How hard had Cassian fought to get them out of Scarif?

"We didn't escape unscathed, if it wasn't obvious. Who are you?"

He shuffled in place, puffing out his chest.

"The name's Voruc."

Jyn allowed her lips to twitch in acknowledgement.

"I'm Tanith. This is Serchill."

The lie spilled over her lips, easy as breathing. But, using the name of a likely dead man in place of Cassian's—her fault, he was dead because of her—felt like poison, like sacrilege. The way Cassian stiffened told her that he wasn't too happy about invoking their comrade's name either.

Force, how many bodies did they leave behind on Scarif?

"Well, Tanith, Serchill, I hope we won't be having a fleet of Star Destroyers following you to Otrarvis," Voruc mused, glancing from them to the ship and up to the sky. "We don't want any trouble with the Empire that we can avoid."

His hand was twitching towards his blaster again. Maybe he was willing to execute them both and blow up the ship to avoid the Empire.

She said, hoping it would placate him, "It was so chaotic, they probably don't know the ship is missing."

And that was probably true. If their luck panned out, the Empire would only know that the ship was destroyed on Scarif.

"Anyone willing to buy it off of us?" Cassian spoke up.

Voruc regarded them with a blank expression, giving nothing away. Jyn wasn't sure if he was going to help them, kill them, or simply tell them to fuck off.

Jyn tensed, trying to balance Cassian and have a hand free enough to unholster the blaster on her hip in case she needed it.

The Mandolorian just pointed to somewhere over Jyn's shoulder. She glanced back to see a squat grey building in the center of the flat stretch of land.

"Your best bet is in there. Look for the rich-looking ones."

Jyn nodded, easing Cassian around so they could walk to where Voruc directed them.

"Thank you," she said, glancing back at him.

Voruc smiled at them, almost seeming sympathetic. Almost.

"Better hurry. Your boyfriend isn't looking too good."

Jyn and Cassian started forward, one staggering step after another.

"Not her boyfriend," Cassian said. He probably should have kept his mouth shut, conserve what little energy he had left, but out of either shock or pride, he just _had_ to say something.

Jyn didn't respond to either Voruc or Cassian. If her arm tightened around Cassian's waist, that was simply a coincidence.

"Coulda fooled me. You're a real di'kut if you haven't gotten on that yet!" Voruc shouted at their backs.

Jyn wasn't going to dignify _that_ with a response either, too busy keeping the two of them upright and moving, but Cassian muttered something under his breath.

"What does that mean?" Jyn asked as soon as they got out of earshot.

Cassian started, looking down at her. "What does what mean?"

"What you just said. What does it mean?"

Jyn glanced up at him to see him looking away, an embarrassed tinge painting his cheeks.

"The translation isn't anything that should be repeated in civilized company," he grumbled.

She couldn't help the amusement and something that definitely _wasn't_ affection that bloomed in her chest.

"I'm 'civilized company'?"

"More civilized than anyone in this shipyard."

It was probably meant to be a compliment but everything and everyone around them seemed to have either a coat of dust or grease. Not much competition.

"Thanks," Jyn drawled.

The building wasn't really that far from where they landed, but the distance felt twice as long. Each step was so tough, with Cassian who both heavier and taller than her leaning on her.

"Should've just left me in the ship with all the walking we've been doing," Cassian muttered.

They were both tired. She could feel each of his labored breaths like they were her own.

"And with all this carrying _I_ have to do, I agree."

They kept going. If Cassian was expecting her to lean him against something and go ahead without him, he was going to be disappointed.

Despite the hundred reasons why she should leave him for dead, there were a hundred thousand why she shouldn't.

She wasn't going to leave him.

"Of course, there had to be stairs," Cassian breathed.

She mentally echoed that sentiment. Sure enough, the entrance of the building was raised up five steps from the ground.

People were coming in and out in ones and twos. Some spared glances at them, out of curiosity or pity. Nobody stopped to help and Jyn almost wanted to scream at them to help.

"Come on," she said.

Cassian pushed off of her shoulder to get up the first step and Jyn almost collapsed as _painpainpain_ bloomed and cut through the haze of exhaustion.

Right. She had been shot.

Jyn recovered quickly, Cassian too absorbed in his pain and effort to notice.

Adrenaline and making sure they got across the shipyard had made her forget the blaster wound that had ripped a hole in her shoulder.

Now, trying to lift Cassian from stair to stair, the wound was clear and present, sending flares of pain every time Cassian put weight on her.

His free hand gripped the railings, grip white-knuckled, but it was limited help.

She breathed through it, blinked black stars from her vision. She needed to get him up. She needed to get money and get him to a hospital.

"You okay?" Cassian asked as soon as the last step was behind them.

His skin looked ashen and clammy and his entire body seemed to be trembling. Jyn wanted to shake him.

What did it matter how she was? A stiff breeze could have blown him over. She was fine, all things considered. He _wasn't_.

"I'm fine. Let's go."

The smell of booze and smoke hit them both as soon as the door slid open.

A slightly hush passed over the patrons, people of all species sizing up the two newcomers. They likely made a sorry sight, but Jyn was visibly armed.

A beat, two beats passed, and they collectively lost interest, turning back to drinks and conversation. There was still a suspicious air, like a few patrons still had their eyes on them.

"We're not worth the trouble," Cassian said in her ear.

Jyn could hear the smile in his voice.

Nobody was willing to find out how hard they would fight if provoked. They'd get 40 credits, a couple of blasters, and some various Imperial garbage for the trouble if they killed Jyn and Cassian.

Definitely not worth it.

Jyn was okay with that.

"Let's have a chat with the bartender."

…

 **Eyyy sorry it's a bit short and also 3 weeks late!**

 **All feedback is appreciated! Hopefully next time the update won't take as much time.**

 **I'm at tiaraofsapphires on Tumblr! Feel free to say hi!**

 **Cheers!**

 **~Tiara of Sapphires**


	5. Chapter 5

**3 So sorry for the long wait! School and brain stuff happened. But here we are!**

 **Enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars or its characters. I just like to mend my wounds with fic…**

…

The world was spinning. Cassian knew the world wasn't supposed to be spinning, but it was spinning.

The dim lights, too-low ceiling, and the choking smell didn't help. He had been in seedy bars before, and while this one was on the higher-end of seedy bars, it still held an air of danger. Even his addled brain could tell that much.

They were being watched, both him and Jyn.

Force, he wanted to lay on the ground and sleep. But Jyn's arm was like a steel band across his back, holding him up, keeping him conscious.

In any other circumstance, he would've indulged in the feeling, being touched by someone with that kind of care. He was too busy making sure the floor didn't come up and hit him in the face.

Jyn led him to a small table and eased him down onto a chair.

To sit down felt like a blessing, each creaking and cracking bone crying in relief.

"Stay," Jyn said firmly, before turning towards the bar.

Cassian wanted to laugh aloud. He wasn't sure what Jyn was talking about. It wasn't like he could go anywhere fast.

His hand drifted to his sidearm as he sat, eyeing the other patrons. This, despite the pain and shock, he was good at. Watching, making predictions, gathering intelligence.

Jyn seemed to hold her own, when his attention fell on her. It happened more often than he cared to admit.

She had perched on the barstool, leaning over to exchange words with the bartender. For a moment, Cassian worried that she was going to pull out a blaster and straight-out threaten the man for information.

He forced himself away from the scene, cursing himself for not keeping a better eye on the rest of the bar. Even then, he tried justifying himself for keeping his attention on Jyn.

The people who surrounded him, these were small-time criminals, henchmen and cronies, drifters and drunks. None of which would be likely to rat them out to the Empire if one or two managed to cut through the liquored haze and recognize them somehow.

He started when Jyn returned, setting a glass of what he assumed to be water onto the table. The bar was too dark, his vision too unfocused for him to tell.

She pushed it into his hand and his fingers sluggishly curled around the glass.

"Drink," she whispered.

It was probably meant to sound like an order, but it sounded more like a plea. His fingers tightened, white-knuckled, at the sound of it.

He was weak. That heavy uselessness sunk into every cell in his body.

He lifted the glass off of the table, got maybe three or four inches before his hand started to shake and he had to set the glass back down.

"Dammit," he hissed.

Jyn leaned forward. Her hand wrapped around her wrist, helping and steadying him as he brought the glass to his lips. Her hand was a fair bit smaller than his, his brain traitorously supplied. Long, thin fingers, calloused and scarred.

He wished that feeling could sustain him.

The liquid trickled between his lips, over his parched tongue. He couldn't tell if it was warm or cool, sensation blurring together into some fuzzy mass.

A couple swallows and suddenly his chest tightened, a sudden panic over loss of oxygen. Water spilled onto his shirt and over their hands as he yanked the glass away, slamming it hard against the table.

He coughed and sputtered, fighting to get air back into his lungs.

"Hey, hey! It's okay. Breathe."

Cassian could barely hear her over the sound of his coughing and his panic, but slowly he was able to breathe.

This was an intolerable condition to be in. How was he still alive? Luck? The Force? One of the many Festan gods whose names had always sounded so powerful and awe-inspiring in his parents' mouths but sounded empty and false in his?

A dubious blessing, to still be alive.

How many things were broken and ruptured inside of him? Was there anything left of him to fix?

Jyn had that pinched look in her face. It said worry, pity, pain, and more worry. He hated it. He wasn't sure if he hated her for looking at him like that or if he hated himself for making her look at him like that.

She still looked beautiful.

Force, he was getting close to being utterly delirious.

The poison pill that he usually kept in his shirt pocket was tucked in his boot. For necessity, in case of capture. It would be quick and—in theory—painless. And the hitherto unnoticed lump it made in his boot almost seemed to mock him.

Leave him to die while she could get off-world and back to the Rebellion. That was the sensible thing for him to do.

He technically took her father away from her, so this could be his penance. His life for her life. His life for her freedom. His life for her future.

If there was one thing he was good at, it was tainting and destroying the things around him. If he could do this one thing for someone who was worth it—worth more than anything Cassian could have hoped to ever encounter—then maybe death wouldn't be so bad.

"Jyn—."

Pragmatism in his tired mouth sounded an awful lot like resignation, defeat, even to his own ears. Jyn clearly caught that much, because her attention snapped to him.

"No."

The sudden fire in her eyes, the need to fight and win, was both welcoming and terrifying.

"Whatever masochistic, suicidal shit is about to leave your mouth, stow it. It's not going to happen."

Cassian nodded, glaring at the spirals in the wooden table. Force, why was he so stupid to think that Jyn would let him go through with it? He didn't have the energy to argue with her, not again. If the time came for him to die to save her, he would do it. The pill, jump in front of a blaster bolt, whatever.

"What's the plan?" he exhaled.

Jyn's fingers tapped a staccato rhythm on the table.

"Priority one is getting you to a hospital."

Again, it was back to him and the weight he dragged behind them. At this point, he could barely walk and the closest hospital was likely miles and miles away. Jyn most likely knew this, so he kept his mouth shut

What sort of debt did she think she owed him that meant she had to drag him around this unfamiliar planet?

"And he might be our key."

She tilted her chin towards the back of the bar.

He waited a beat before he glanced over to see a blue-skinned Twi'lek lounged in a corner booth, scantily-clad sycophants—male and female—flocking around and clearly hanging off his every word.

"Resen Karras," Jyn breathed. "Bartender said he has a grudge against the Empire."

"Think he's got deep pockets?"

Cassian turned back to the table to see the corner of Jyn's mouth twitch upward.

"Judging from the tunic and that gaudy thing around his neck, yes."

He nodded.

Okay. Rich guy, probably has enough credits to get them a speeder and medical supplies. But that meant nothing unless they got the money from him directly. There was no way Karras would be carrying a large sum that they could just take from him.

"What do you plan on doing?"

His first thought was either haggle or threaten. That was what _he_ was used to.

Instead, Cassian watched as the face of a haggard soldier sitting across from him dissolved into that of a coquettish girl. If he had been drinking something, he would've likely choked. Again.

"I plan on flirting with him."

While there was a flintiness to her eyes that gave away to him the fact she was acting, something ugly and heavy condensed in Cassian's chest and he did his best to swallow it down.

…

 **Things are going to start moving again soon! I promise! Again, sorry for the short and late chapter but…school.**

 **All feedback is appreciated!**

 **Come say hi on my Tumblr tiaraofsapphires!**

 **Cheers!**

 **~Tiara of Sapphires**


	6. Chapter 6

**Look at that! I updated a thing! And it's a fair bit longer than Chapter 5! Go me!**

 **Enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars or its characters. I just like to mend my wounds with fic…**

…

This was going to be a disaster.

How in infinite hells was Jyn was going to _seduce_ Resen Karras out of his money, she had no idea.

She probably looked like death, a reanimated corpse that had dragged itself from the trenches of war. Which, now that she thought about it, wasn't that far from the truth. She definitely _felt_ that way.

Jyn was sinew and muscle, even when puberty filled out the child-like lankiness. Being on the brink of starvation more times than she cared to admit destroyed any girlish figure she could possibly have. She never got to be soft and rounded like the women in the holos and the pin-ups she would glance at in Saw's camp.

As she stood now, she was dirt and battle and muscle and hollowed-out angles and probably smelled terrible.

She undid her hair so it fell loose around her shoulders. Her fingers combed through the strands. A minor improvement.

It also didn't help that the anesthetic was fading and pain was filtering back in. She rolled her shoulder delicately and winced when pain skittered down to her fingertips.

Yeah, that shoulder wound was not going to help things one bit. How could she be a flirt if she was biting back a grimace the entire time?

She glanced back. Any insecurity she felt was chased away by the dimming hope in Cassian's eyes. The man was dying, it was her fault, and she'd be damned if she didn't do all she could to make sure he stayed alive.

" _I've been in this fight since I was 6 years old."_

Jyn remembered the venom in his voice. They both had been so angry at the time. It was a miracle they hadn't tried to kill each other right then.

Neither of them had been children for a long time. But, she tried to imagine it. Child Cassian, baby-faced, with the same eyes, in the arms of a woman who looked like him.

His mother was probably dead too. Jyn never asked, never had the chance to ask. But there were some things that were apparent, a secret language between those that war had sunk its claws into.

She mentally shook herself. Now was not the time for them to exchange sob stories. She had a lead, and she needed to follow-up.

Resen Karras. The potential answer to their problem.

She made her way towards his table. One foot in front of the other, shoulders back, head tall. There was a confidence in her posture that she really didn't feel on the inside.

The other occupants at the table immediately looked to her, but the man at the head of the table took his time to turn his attention to Jyn.

"What can I do for you, doll?" Karras said, sipping on his glass.

He was decadently nonchalant for someone sitting in a shithole of a bar in a backwater planet. She stepped forward until she was almost touching the table.

"Name's Tanith. I hear you're in the business of making deals."

Karras cocked a brow.

"That I am. Why don't you sit down?"

He gestured at a chair, and its occupant quickly stood, making way for her.

"Thank you," she muttered.

She sat down, angling herself so she could just barely see Cassian from the corner of her eye. If something happened, she'd be over there in an instant, blaster blazing.

"I need to disappear. And I hear that you'd be willing to buy an Imperial starship."

He grinned, white teeth almost glittering in the low light.

"Ah, yes. The piece that's sitting in the shipyard?"

"The same."

"Let's see it, shall we?"

Jyn moved to stand up—she assumed he wanted to see the ship in-person—but instead the younger Twi'lek next to Karras handed him a small device.

Karras fiddled with it, and a holograph of a ship appeared over the device. Schematics of various ships scrolled through until it landed on the same one that Jyn and Cassian had flown in on earlier.

Jyn tilted her head, unsure as to how he had a schematic of the ship.

Karras smirked, seeing her confusion. "I know about anything and everything that lands here, doll," he said.

Jyn nodded. So, the man had more power than the bartender had let on. This could be a boon or a bane, depending on how good her negotiating skills were.

The image rotated, tilted this way and that as Karras toyed with it. It was clear he did this often and knew his way around ships.

"Nice roomy cargo hold, quality hyperdrive," he mused. He didn't sound impressed, but not bored either. Jyn didn't know how to feel about that. One moment could have her with the money she needed or could have her leaving the bar empty-handed and desperate to find another way to get Cassian healed.

The hologram flickered out of existence and his attention turned back to her.

"What about dead-man-walking?" he asked, gesturing behind her. Her eyes followed for a brief moment. He was referring to Cassian.

"You two seem pretty chummy," Karras continued. "Jumping ship for something still breathing?"

She kept her expression carefully light, letting her eyes roam over Cassian's form before turning her attention back to Karras. Even from far away, she knew Cassian was still hanging on, watching the exchange. How he was still conscious was a mystery to her.

"Oh, him? He's deadweight. I plan on getting rid of him after selling the ship," Jyn explained nonchalantly, shrugging.

Again, lie after lie spilled out of her mouth, as effortless as breathing.

Karras smirked. "Well, don't off him in here. The management doesn't like blood seeping into the floorboards."

The thought of it turned her stomach. He might die without her having to do anything. She could glance back in a minute to a slumped-over body, growing cold.

She leaned forward, smiling. Whatever expression was on her face—halfway between alluring and predatory—had Karras's brow arching.

"Don't worry. It'd be clean."

Karras laughed, clapping his hands.

"Ah, I like you. You've got some fire in you."

Jyn smiled.

The amusement on Karras' face disappeared and something serious and business-like replaced it.

"So, the ship. Not gonna lie, doll, you've piqued my interest. After what those Imperial pieces of shit did to my home planet Ryloth, any way that screws them over, I'm ready to contribute."

Relief coursed through her, unseen. She was halfway there. Now she just needed the number.

"It's practically spotless. Nobody knows it's gone," Jyn said, going in for the kill. "I ask for 15 thousand credits for it."

To her shock, Karras let out an incredulous laugh, and his companions giggled with him. Jyn stayed decidedly neutral, waiting for the amusement to pass.

This wasn't good. She was sure 15 thousand was a fair price. Really, the ship was worth probably around 25, but she definitely wasn't going to push it that far. All she needed was enough money for transport into the city, enough to get Cassian into a bacta tank or _something_ , enough to get them into friendlier space.

"It's a risk to take it. That risk ain't worth 15. I'll give you 10," Karras said.

Jyn's jaw tightened for a split second.

"C'mon. That ship is worth more than 10 and you know it."

Karras crossed his arms over his chest. "Do I, Tanith?"

"What you can get done with that ship will pay back your investment at least 3 times over."

Jyn wasn't sure what kind of business Karras was in, but she knew that people didn't get rich this far out in the galaxy without doing something illegal. Selling spice, machines, people, intelligence. She wouldn't be surprised if he had connections to the Hutts or to some other gang.

She leaned forward, lowering her voice. "I know you have feelers across this quadrant. It's a great asset to have a ship like that in case you need to go through Imperial territory going about your _business_.

"If you won't go up to 15, go up to 12. It's a good deal, Karras."

Jyn was toeing a line and she knew it. One wrong word, pushing too hard too fast could shut down the deal entirely and she'd walk away with nothing.

Karras mused slowly, "Most of these nobodies would bow to the first deal they can get, but you're different. I like that. But—,"

Jyn tensed, hope and dread growing in tandem. She was so close. The offer was there, sure a few thousand short of her plan, but she could work with it.

What was the hold up?

Karras drummed his fingers on his chin, deep in thought. Everyone around the table watched him, waiting for his word.

Finally, he gestured at her chest.

"Throw in that pretty necklace of yours and you got a deal for 12 thousand. All or nothing."

Jyn's eyes fell to her chest. She hadn't noticed that her necklace wasn't tucked into her shirt the entire time. It had just been dangling against her chest for all to see. Her world tilted for a moment, the pain and the noise muting to just her heartbeat, thudding in her chest and in her ears.

Her necklace, the kyber crystal strung on a piece of brown string. It was what stood between two refugees and potential salvation.

Despite that knowledge, she wanted to hunch into herself, hide the kyber crystal from view.

In this war, she didn't get to have many possessions. Anything and everything could be given up at a moment's notice for the good of the cause. Saw told her that after someone tried to snatch her necklace while she was trying to sleep. It had felt like the thief had tried to steal her soul.

Jyn had beat the thief bloody, rage and bottled-up grief giving her the strength of someone 3 times her size for a moment. Nobody dared try something like that again, but the lesson, the fear stuck.

"12 thousand credits for my ship and my necklace?" she repeated.

Karras nodded, rapping his knuckles smartly on the wooden table in front of him.

"My terms. Take 'em or leave 'em. And I'm sure I'm the only one for miles who would be this nice."

She wanted to be sick, but it was also as if her spine had become made of the same crystal that hung around her neck: transparent, seemingly delicate, but stronger than almost anything in the galaxy.

'Trust the Force.' That was one of the last things Lyra Erso said to her. At the time, Jyn accepted it at face-value, a child's innocence and trust. In Saw's camp, there was no Force, only war. In hiding, there was only survival.

And now?

"Deal."

If she had meant to tack a 'no' at the beginning of that sentence, it was left unsaid. That single word left her mouth like a death knell, a stark finality. Even Karras looked surprised, as if he had thought his offer had been too much for her.

But the game was up. And he couldn't go back on his word without looking bad in front of his friends.

Karras leaned forward in his chair, clapping his hands together.

"It's a deal."

Jyn reached back behind the curtain of her hair and undid the knot. Her shoulder screamed at her for doing so and her fingers shook from the pain, but the knot loosened.

She held necklace for a moment, the clear crystal stood stark in the dirty, bloody cradle of her hand. She didn't glance over to where Cassian sat, not sure what she'd see if she did.

Suddenly, a yawning ache formed in her chest, something like nostalgia or grief. 'The strongest stars have hearts of kyber.' Jyn wished Chirrut was with her. She hadn't known him long, but she knew he was like a stone in the middle of a storm, unmoving. She needed that kind of strength. She hoped he was okay, while a tiny, wise voice told her he probably wasn't.

Jyn lifted the crystal up to her mouth and kissed it. Inexplicably warm and smooth, Jyn pretended for a second that she was drinking in its energy, whatever blessings her mother had put into it the moment she had tied it around Jyn's neck.

"Forgive me," Jyn whispered, breath fogging against the stone.

She wasn't sure whose forgiveness she was asking.

Karras held out his hand, expectant. She was grateful that there wasn't any obvious smugness to his expression or she probably would've punch him, ending the deal and sealing Cassian's fate.

She gave him the necklace and she swallowed back a cry like one would swallow broken glass.

The transaction was swift, and she was holding a chip with 12 thousand credits in her hand.

The deal was done. It was over.

"Pleasure doing business with you," Karras said, as one of his lackeys scurried off to check the ship.

Jyn didn't glance down at his closed fist, not wanting to acknowledge the fact that her mother's necklace lay hidden between his fingers. Jyn smiled tightly, the urge to blast a hole in his skull and take back the necklace twitching through her muscles.

She just pocketed the money and turned back, feeling both lighter than air and heavier than stone. Regret didn't take hold like she thought it would. Instead, she felt dazed, strangely energized. Like a thousand paths just opened before her and she didn't know which one to take.

Cassian pushed himself to his feet when she stopped next to their table. He stared at her with an indiscernible expression, but she could see the anger most clearly.

He looked a little bit better, but she could've been imagining things. A trick of the light, maybe. His grip on his chair, the one thing helping him stay upright, was white-knuckled and trembling.

"We have the money, let's go," she said.

He didn't move except to lean forward a touch closer to her, enough that he loomed over her. The muscles in his jaw jumped as he clenched and unclenched.

"You shouldn't have done that," Cassian hissed.

Jyn barked a humorless laugh before she could think better of it. Like he could tell her what to do. A stiff wind could blow him over and they— _he_ didn't have enough time.

Impatience boiled along with the loss and anger in her veins, a volatile cocktail that was going to do… _something_. She just wasn't sure what.

They had the money. What were they waiting for? They didn't have time for this.

"That necklace—I'm not worth—," he sputtered, shaking his head.

"Shut up!" Jyn snapped, her voice louder than she anticipated.

The conversations closest to them died for a moment, curiosity spiking through the air, only to dissipate.

She closed the space between them, one hand gripping the lapel of his shirt.

For a moment, she didn't care that he was injured, that they were in unfamiliar territory, surrounded by people with blasters and vibroblades and fists. It was her turn to spit venom, to let herself crack and let the anger spill out. Just a little. Then she would sew herself back together and move on, like she always did.

It wasn't fair. All her life she gave and gave to this galaxy, to the Force, to the Rebellion, _whatever_ , and for what? She lost her mother, her father, her mentor—damn it all, she didn't have a chance to bury any of them—, now the last tangible traces of her family were gone. She made her choices and tried to do good after years of trying not to give a damn about the galaxy crumbling around her and those choices bit her in the ass over and over again.

What did she have left, but this ragged, prickly Rebellion intelligence officer who had the _audacity_ to tell her that he wasn't worth it?

He came back for her so many times—something nobody else could claim to have done—and the one time she could pay him back, he told her he wasn't worthy of this?

She dragged him down the few inches so they were almost eye-level. If he winced, she didn't notice, didn't care. Not now.

Her lip trembled and her eyes burned but she refused to cry. She forced herself to stare Cassian in the eye—a threat, a promise, an affirmation of a vow she didn't know she had made the moment they first locked eyes on Yavin IV.

"Shut up. Not another fucking word," she growled, each word grinding out like metal against stone. "It's done. We're going."

She felt Cassian's shaky breath as much as she heard it.

He leaned forward and for a moment Jyn was afraid that he was going to collapse. She wasn't sure she'd be able to catch him if he did. But he stopped himself, his forehead resting lightly against hers.

Jyn stood frozen in shock, anger leaving her in a rush and being replaced with something else. She didn't glance up, didn't dare to glance up. She just stared forward at the space where his shirt ended and his neck began.

He breathed something in the same language she had heard earlier, his breath puffing over her face. A couple short phrases, barely audible.

It sounded like an apology and a thank-you. It sounded like a prayer.

She watched his throat move around each word and she had a sudden insane urge to bury her face into his chest and feel and feel until she could feel nothing.

He pulled away, abruptly—as abruptly as one could in his weakened state—eyes wide in shock. Perhaps he was just as surprised by that brief moment of tenderness as she was.

She felt dizzy, nauseous. Her chest was tight.

"Let's go," she whispered, voice brittle and wavering.

She wondered what he had said to her, but couldn't find the courage to ask.

Gathering her strength, she dragged him out of the bar and back into the shipyard.

…

 **AHAHAHAAHAAAAAA (man this is a slowburn, huh?)**

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 **~Tiara of Sapphires**


	7. Chapter 7

**3333333 all of that lovely feedback! You all are amazing!**

 **Sorry this took a long-ass while to finish but school and Mass Effect: Andromeda and May 4** **th** **exchange were definitely taking a good portion of my attention.**

 **Enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars or its characters. I just like to mend my wounds with fic…**

…

Cassian tried his best to keep upright, keep his eyes open. Something was rattling and shifting inside of him, perhaps many somethings. Broken bones, ruptured organs.

He needed a doctor for that, whatever was wrong with him.

He would probably also need someone to fix his tongue because he was damn close to biting a hole through it after what punch-drunk sentimentalities came spilling out without his permission.

 _Gracias. Mi coraz_ _ó_ _n. Gracias._

The words had come unbidden from Cassian's mouth. In his native tongue, not in Basic.

He must've hit his head. An aneurysm, a concussion, a stroke, something. Something knocked a screw or two loose inside his skull.

 _Thank you. My heart. Thank you._

He shouldn't have said it, but he figured she couldn't understand what he was saying so in the end it didn't matter. What scared him was that he _meant_ what he said.

Cassian's mind spun as they made each painful step away from the bar.

He lied a lot for a living, for the good of the Rebellion. He was used to lying to people, to gain their trust, to get information.

This wasn't a lie. He couldn't bring himself to lie to her. To this woman who continued to give even though he kept taking things from her.

Her father, her chance for whatever freedom could be found in this galaxy, now the necklace that used to hang from her neck.

A couple more syllables out of his mouth and he would've been sailing off the point of no return. She still wouldn't know what he was saying, but _he_ would know.

Cassian tried to swallow back those thoughts, pain making the world feel loopy and nonsensical.

The ground under his feet was liquid and the only solid pillar in existence was now the woman who had one arm braced across his back and the other keeping his arm slung across her shoulders.

Trying to keep the moving, trying to find a solution.

He knew how he felt and he knew that this was something that should never have happened. It wasn't prudent or sane of him to feel what he was feeling. The tightness in his chest that had nothing and everything to do with his injuries, the fact that he felt drawn to her like they were opposite poles on a magnet.

They weren't opposites. They were cut from similar cloth and formed into the beings, broken, stumbling, clinging, that they were today.

To watch her hand over that necklace—he knew of its importance to her even though she never said it out loud—to that slimeball of a man for _him_ , brought about that wave of affection that he wanted to believe was only righteous anger.

Crippling, corrosive, _compromising_ affection. The kind of thing that could break a mission and get him killed. He never allowed himself to be so weak. For the sake of his life, his ability to be useful to the Rebellion.

Kaytoo would probably have told him he was being unwise and nonsensical, maybe spout off a couple statistics as to how this was going to end up getting him killed. His own brain was already telling him what he was feeling was a bad idea.

He had known her for only a handful of days. Too much of that time had been spent tearing into each other.

 _You might as well be a Stormtrooper._

 _Suddenly the Rebellion is real for you._

They were both wrong and both right, at the time. It had to be said, in the aftermath of Eadu, which now felt so far away.

Jyn lost her father. Cassian's worldview had shifted under his feet.

Seeing Jyn's eyes reflected in the eyes of the man he was supposed to kill, how could he do it? How could he kill him? But, apparently, he didn't have a choice in whether or not Galen Erso lived or died.

Galen Erso had looked so small and sad as he lay unmoving, unseeing, in Jyn's arms. Cassian never got the chance to say goodbye to his parents, so he couldn't help but feel envious.

And then they spat at each other aboard their stolen ship.

Energy and time, wasted.

His chest hurt. Each pulse of his heart he feared could be his last.

A doctor. He needed a doctor.

"We need transport into the city," Jyn said.

Cassian started, not realizing that they had stopped in front of a speeder, Jyn speaking to its owner.

Though she said it practically into his ear, each word sounded far away, like he was underwater and she was standing at the surface.

The tone of her voice brokered no argument, from what he could hear.

Garbled words that he couldn't understand. Everything moved around him, maybe he passed out. But the next thing he knew he was being eased down on the bed of the speeder.

Jyn flopped down next to him, pressed against his side. She was warm, like a sun. She was bright, like a sun.

Yes. He needed a doctor.

He didn't know if he'd be able to get up again and he didn't think Jyn would be able to carry him to wherever they were going. He didn't say it aloud. He had taken enough from Jyn; he wasn't about to take her hope as well.

His tongue was cotton, head full of rocks. He didn't know if he could speak even if he wanted to.

He tried not to lean into her, as much as he wanted to. But gravity, the jostling of the speeder, his own weakness, had him slumping ever closer.

He took solace in the fact that they were at least going somewhere. If he died en route, at least Jyn had enough money to get off planet and get back to the Rebellion.

The thought that she would instead disappear into anonymity crossed his mind, cause forgotten, for an instant, but he quickly banished it.

No, he saw enough into her heart. She would fight, keep fighting. There was no room for running anymore.

His eyes fluttered open and shut, open and shut. He knew he needed to stay awake, but the thought of sleep was so enticing.

Times where he could get a decent rest were few and far between. His bunk on Yavin was empty more often than not.

When he could sleep, that was when the dreams came.

There was kind where a nameless, faceless contact betrayed him and he faced the firing squad. At least the ending was always quick, as the first bolt hit his chest. He would wake up without pain as adrenaline coursed through his veins.

Then there were the dreams where the Empire didn't exist. Where his parents lived to see him grow. The mere suggestion of peace, only snatched away when he woke up.

He wasn't sure which kind of dream was worse.

A glance over, just the barest tilt of the head, to see Jyn staring forward. The muscles in her jaw jumped and moved as she clenched her teeth.

Cassian knew that it wouldn't have been likely for their paths to cross except for in a time of war. It was a depressing thought: that they would only have met each other at the crossroads of two painful lives.

Her Coruscanti accent would have been strange in the mix of his Festan family. His mother and father would have met her with open arms, regardless. His mother would have clucked over how malnourished she looked. She would have made sure she ate, gave her a soft bed to sleep on.

Probably would have made a comment or two that would have had Cassian's face burning with embarrassment.

A simple life, not without trouble, but definitely without a seemingly unending war.

He wanted to kiss her.

Instead, he let his hand drift to where hers was balled into a fist on her knee.

Jyn jumped in surprise when they touched, enough that even he could notice. Cassian didn't, _couldn't_ , look at her face, instead kept his eyes trained on where his hand covered hers.

Slowly, her hand opened up, turning so they were palm to palm, fingers interlacing together.

Dirt and dried blood dug underneath her cracked and uneven fingernails. Her hands weren't soft, but neither were his.

It was perfect. He let himself sink into that one point of contact.

He could let himself have that delirious fantasy of a future with Jyn in it. Where he could hold her hand and kiss her whenever he wanted and never having to worry that the next moment could have them snatched away from each other.

It was a good fantasy, something unlikely. Kay would likely have spouted infinitesimal odds. Just like Cassian's odds of living to see the end of this war.

At this point, he would be lucky to survive the week, even to the end of the day.

The world turned dark as they flew under a tunnel.

Stars blacked out his vision and he jerked as best he could in fear.

He couldn't see. He couldn't _think_.

Where was he? What kind of punishment was this?

Why wouldn't they just let him die?

"Cassian? Cassian!"

Cassian took in a shuttering breath, forcing himself to see.

He was tired, too heavy.

Jyn's hands were on his face, cradling his head.

Gods, it was good to see.

She was alive. And that was all that matter to him anymore. Why wouldn't she just let him die?

He was so tired.

"Look at me. Hey, stay awake," she said, each word slow and loud.

Cassian made some kind of noise in the back of his throat.

He almost wanted to hate her for trying to keep him alive.

"Jyn," he said.

That was the only word that could come out.

He was so tired.

…

 **Get rekt Cassian.**

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 **Come say hi on my Tumblr and drop a rebelcaptain prompt in my inbox until June 21 7pm PST! I am tiaraofsapphires**

 **Cheers!**

 **~Tiara of Sapphires**


	8. Chapter 8

**Well…sorry about taking forever to update…but…yeah, I don't have a clever excuse.**

 **Regardless, thanks so much for the lovely feedback, it's much appreciated!**

 **Enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars or its characters. I just like to mend my wounds with fic…**

…

He looked at her like he saw everything in her face, like he had found the answer to some question that had hounded him for years.

Cassian's eyes rolled back until only the whites showed and his body went limp.

It happened within seconds, just a wisp of time between consciousness and unconsciousness. Jyn was frozen, could only watch as if a detached observer.

"No."

It was more of a ghost of a word than anything else, a helpless prayer.

"No!"

She reached for him again. This time, her hands reached for the side of his neck, over his chest, just over his mouth and nose.

Shallow breathing, faint pulse. It wasn't much.

But it told her one thing: the only thing that mattered. He was alive. That meant there was still hope for him.

 _How_ he was still hanging on, she didn't know.

Perhaps out of some sense of masochism or extreme stubbornness.

Force, after he made a full recovery, she was going to kill him.

"Hurry up!" she screeched at the owner of the speeder, who introduced himself as Spen. Her patience was hanging by a thread and she was close to snapping and hijacking the speeder, consequences and cover be damned.

"I'll pay you double if you get us both in one piece to the hospital right fucking now."

 _That_ got his attention. Jyn didn't bet that common decency or a sense of morality would make him drive any faster. No, the idea of a higher pay, a thousand credits instead of five hundred, was plenty motivation.

People shouted and horns blared around them as he sped through the streets, hopefully bringing them closer to their destination.

Jyn turned to Cassian. He looked half-dead, maybe more. She looped her fingers around his wrist, feeling the faint pulse.

He had held her hand only minutes earlier. She knew he was trying to be strong, trying to keep himself awake.

She loved holding his hand, she had realized. His fingers were calloused, like hers. Bigger than hers. It felt like comfort, a little something that she could hold close to her heart.

Then he dozed off, _something_. His hand went limp in hers. His eyes were open and vacant, face scrunched and lined. His jaw had been clenched, like he was in pain.

Fear, horrible fear, had taken hold of her and she tried to shake him awake. He couldn't leave her, not like this.

Then he woke up, and then he collapsed.

It wasn't fair. They were so close. He just needed to stay awake, she just needed to keep him awake. And she was failing.

She took his hand in both of hers, watching him for any sign of life.

When he woke up—she told herself he would wake up—she was going to chew him out for scaring her like this.

The speeder stopped almost abruptly in front of a building.

"This isn't a hospital!" Jyn yelled.

It wasn't. This was a squat and dingy building, nothing like a clean and sterile hospital.

She shot Spen a look of pure fury and poison. He shrugged, utterly unapologetic.

"It's a clinic. The nearest real hospital's at least another 20 minutes away and I highly doubt your boyfriend's gonna survive that long."

Jyn had to mentally hold herself back from punching the man in the face. She and Cassian were in unknown waters and as much as she wanted to, she couldn't compromise their cover by alerting the authorities.

Spen shrugged again. The nonchalance of his demeanor only grated on her nerves. He stood before a dying man and seemed to feel nothing.

"They have bacta tanks. I know that."

Her jaw cracked at how hard she clenched her teeth. Then she glanced back to Cassian. He was too pale, almost motionless.

They didn't have _time_.

"Fine."

The transaction was quick, an amount of credits so large it would've been obscene if not for the emergency. She could only hope she got across to him that if he tricked them, she would hunt him down and make him suffer.

She was a rebel, not a saint. She would kill, no matter how unrighteous it was.

If Cassian died because of this man, she was willing to live by the adage 'a life for a life'.

Jyn knelt down and hooked one arm under Cassian's armpits.

Pain bloomed in her shoulder as she strained to get him even an inch off of the speeder floor.

Fuck, she also needed a doctor. Fucking blaster wound. But Cassian needed a doctor more than she did.

Just maybe some anesthetic and a change in bandages and bacta would suffice.

Spen just watched as she struggled to get Cassian up. All the more reason for Jyn to hate him.

Cassian was heavier than he looked, most of him was lean muscle. Jyn was no stranger of lifting heavy things, but however many pounds of limp weight were something she wasn't used to.

"Come on," she wheezed with effort.

She wished she had Baze's strength. He could've probably hoisted Cassian across his shoulders and carried him into the clinic like he weighed nothing.

Jyn managed to get him at least partially to his feet, though he was still not helping her in any sense.

"Come on, Cassian. We're getting you to a doctor. They're gonna patch you up," she whispered.

Cassian's head lolled against her chest.

Finally, he was in a position where she could move him.

At least, Spen had the decency to help her get him off of the actual speeder before driving off. Jyn didn't want him to touch Cassian, but she wasn't exactly in a position to protest.

Now, it was a several feet walk into the lobby. The people milling the street walked around them, only a few hesitating to look.

No pity for a dying man.

The clinic door opened and the smell of antiseptic and infection and death hit like a wall.

Jyn wanted to be sick.

The noise hit next: moans of pain and cries of suffering and sorrow.

Jyn wanted to be sick again.

She dragged him into the lobby and found the first person who looked like they worked in the clinic. She expected to find a crush of people; she had been in enough rickety clinics like this to expect it.

But there were mostly mourners, those at vigil, huddled in groups here and there around the open area.

"I need a doctor," Jyn rasped.

The woman sitting at the desk looked at her and then looked Cassian and Jyn watched as her eyes widened.

"Oh."

Yeah. Oh.

"Please. Help him. Whatever money you need, I'll pay it. Just fix him, please."

Jyn was entirely serious. She had plenty of money left to spend and she would dump it all on the clinic if it meant saving Cassian's life.

She could steal for food, for more money. She had nothing else to bargain with.

"He's going to need a bacta tank," the nurse said. "That's six thousand credits up front."

Jyn hesitated for a moment, not because of the large amount of money, but because of how dangerous this was. Who knew what kind of Imperial agents lurked in the streets and were in this clinic?

She had been leaving a lot of things up to chance, ever since she was picked up from Wobani. She went to Scarif fully aware she was likely to die, but she was alive. Chance had kept her and Cassian alive but she worried their luck will run out, right here.

But, what choice did she have?

"Alright. Deal."

The nurse looked surprised, like she had assumed Jyn wouldn't have been able to pay for it. Perhaps she was used to people with that kind of money eschewing a clinic and going to an actual hospital.

Jyn couldn't honestly blame them for the high price. They had to make money somehow.

Jyn paid the full amount, still struggling under Cassian's weight.

As soon as the money was exchanged, the nurse rounded the little desk to help hold up Cassian.

"Who is he?" the nurse asked.

"My husband, Teran Hallik. I'm Liana," Jyn said.

The lie was out of her mouth instantly. Her alias, just add a random male name and she was golden. She probably looked panicked enough that people would buy it.

"And I'm staying with him," Jyn said shortly.

She wasn't going to let anyone tell her different.

The nurse didn't argue with her. Instead, the nurse limped Cassian through the narrow halls to a small room.

"A lot of people can't afford using the bacta tank, so we have one open. It's your husband's lucky day."

"Yeah, lucky," Jyn breathed.

Cassian's head lolled against her chest, still warm and faintly breathing.

Gently, they set him down on a rickety cot.

Someone, she assumed was a doctor, walked in, followed by a medical droid.

She had expected a wait, but she supposed since she paid upfront it meant she got priority.

Jyn backed up to a corner, leaving them to do their work.

They cut off Cassian's shirt first, segments of cloth dropping to the floor.

Jyn imagined that in another context, another life, when he didn't fall multiple stories and let his injuries sit for hours and hours and wasn't about to be placed in a bacta tank to continue fighting for his life, she would be blushing.

His torso was an ugly myriad of bruises, blackened and blued and purpled.

Jyn's empty stomach roiled in protest.

It was the most exposed and vulnerable she had ever seen him. Sure, they changed clothing in the small space of _Rogue One_ , but adrenaline and fear made it impossible for her to think on it at the time.

She listened to them as they scanned, as they put him in the tank, though in hindsight she shouldn't have. The things she heard didn't help in giving her hope.

Things like broken bones, ruptured organs, sepsis, nerve damage, lucky to still be breathing.

They were lucky to get off Scarif alive. They were lucky to have gotten this far.

It was minutes, hours, she didn't know, before Cassian was in the tank. The organics left the room to deal with the next disaster. The medical droid stayed, adjusting the bacta tank's settings.

Jyn just sat, across from the tank, watching as Cassian floated there.

He looked even more exposed and vulnerable in the tank. Naked except for some cloth to preserve his modesty. A mask over his mouth. Eyes closed in sleep.

He had said he had been fighting since he was six.

And he must have been at least twenty-something years old, maybe thirty-something. Older than she was, that was for sure.

Maybe he was involved in the Clone Wars, maybe in a civil war on his homeworld. She didn't know.

She didn't know enough about the man.

A spy, a soldier, a man.

She didn't want to think about it. A child too young to be touched by war, much less in an army.

She might never hear the story. She could only hope that the Rebel Alliance had found him early.

Saw's camp was hardly bearable for a child her age, much less a girl-child. Even with Saw watching her every move and making sure the grizzled members of his band didn't harm her outside of a training context.

She still got hurt, beat into something.

So soft and small, they had been. Then, broken and molded into soldiers, some of the best against the Empire.

It could've been different. She wished it was, but over the years it became clear that there was no use in wasting time and energy on wishing.

Jyn just sat in the corner, hyperaware and totally exhausted.

Cassian looked almost ethereal in a twisted sort of way, mostly clean, face relaxed in sleep. And then there were the half- dozen tubes in his abdomen alone, one sticking into the left side of his chest.

A reminder. Dead man walking. Or _floating_.

A hysterical laugh escaped Jyn before she slapped her hand over her mouth.

She stood on numb legs, walking as if on autopilot to the bacta tank. She pressed her hand against the chilled surface. There was a thin film on the glass, as if it hadn't been cleaned for a while. In hindsight, it was disgusting and unsanitary, but then again this clinic wasn't the pinnacle of cleanliness in any sense of the word.

They got Cassian _towards_ a stable condition, if the Basic on the controls told her anything.

Her breath fogged up the glass as she leaned forward.

"Come back to me."

It hit her that without Cassian, she was alone. Chirrut and Baze and Bodhi were gone, maybe forever. Her father was dead. Saw and his Partisans were blown to hell. She had no way to get back to the Rebellion, and Cassian was her only living connection to the Rebellion anyway.

She was of no use to the Rebellion and with no one to vouch for her if Cassian died.

Daughter of a dead Imperial scientist, outlived her usefulness.

Firing squad or a cell. That was what her fate would likely be.

Her life was forfeit.

She had nothing, but Cassian.

And even though her reasons were selfish for wanting him to live, she knew there was an underpinning of something else.

"I can't lose you too. Please."

…

 **All feedback is appreciated!**

 **Come say hi on Tumblr at tiaraofsapphires!**

 **Cheers!**

 **~Tiara of Sapphires**


	9. Chapter 9

**UHHHH. IM SO SORRY. I SUBMITTED THE WRONG CHAPTER AND I CAN'T BELIEVE IT TOOK A WEEK FOR ME TO CHANGE IT SHIT SHIT MY BAD.**

 **So…uh, sorry about the hiatus. Life and school happened. But thank you so much to all who commented and stuff! Makes it all worthwhile!**

 **Enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars or its characters. I just like to mend my wounds with fic…**

…

Cassian's dreams were hazy and unfocused at some points, vivid and sharp at others.

No more pain, at least for now. Thank the Force for small blessings. Or maybe he wasn't capable of sensing it anymore. He had seen it happen before: a perfectly-placed hit robbing a man of all feeling. It was seen as a mercy when the man died days later. Cassian had agreed at the time, but now he wasn't so sure.

He did feel cold, weightless. Like he was underwater. But not drowning. He had no experience with drowning, but he assumed his body would've been in more of a state of panic if he was drowning.

Slowly, barely, his eyes opened.

A blindingly bright expanse met him, shadows moving just outside of his field of vision.

No, too bright.

Was he dead? Injured?

His eyes shut again.

…

He dreamt of the Citadel. The memory was too new, shiny like freshly-spilt blood. He dreamt of climbing just below Jyn and he could see the record, the all-important record, clipped to her belt. She was going to be a hero and all he had to do was follow. Cassian had accepted that he was probably follow this woman to the very end.

His limbs were leadened, each movement delayed, every second she climbed higher and higher and he couldn't keep up.

"I'll be right behind you," he had said, right before she jumped onto the records tower.

He wasn't keeping his promise very well.

Then, a door hissed open and blasterfire screamed through the space, three figures in the shadows.

Cassian was too slow, couldn't get to his blaster in time, a cry of warning drying up on his mouth, unsaid.

A red bolt struck Jyn and she fell, absolutely silent. She plummeted past him, her hair streaming over her face, hiding her from him.

He couldn't move, couldn't scream. He only watched and heard her hit the platform so far below them with a jarring thump.

The records tower evaporated to smoke beneath his hands.

…

Something wet was dripping on his face. He heard a soft sniffle.

He couldn't move or open his eyes. No pain, just numbness.

A soft pressure on his forehead, something whispered, wordless like a breeze.

A hallucination, nothing more.

Unfeeling darkness swallowed him up.

…

The next he knew he was huddled in a forest.

He was lucky, then.

It was the middle of the summer months on Fest when his village was destroyed by the Empire. If it had been the winter and he had fled to the forest, he surely would have frozen to death before dawn.

Cassian had found a large divot in a tree, remembered how it was a good hide-and-seek spot, a game played by children who now burned in their homes. Just big enough for him to hide in. He pulled some brush over the hole for camouflage and curled into as small a ball as possible.

It was cold, still. His pajamas weren't meant for being slept in outside. His mother would've wrapped him up in layers and a coat before even thinking of sending him outside.

His mother.

Grief clutched at his throat, but he was silent.

He wished he was dead, that he didn't make it out of his burning house and just died with his parents. But the instinctual part of him wanted to live.

He waited in the cold until the sun rose, unmoving for fear of discovery, until the rays of light blinded him.

…

Cassian awoke to pain and movement.

Head on his chest, feet dragging along, nerves on fire.

Unaware, not moving under his own control.

He couldn't speak to tell whoever was holding him to let go.

He was grateful when a pain like electricity wrapped around his chest and knocked him unconscious.

…

" _Lay low, cut the fuel line, don't get caught._ "

Cassian was given that directive. Pretty easy instructions, simple enough for a child to understand.

He was eight, at least that's what the Alliance told him. He was old enough to be useful, not just another mouth to be fed.

He snuck into the Imperial facility, blade tucked in his shirtsleeve, small and unnoticed.

His vibroblade cut through the tube, spilling fuel over his hands. It smelled foul, almost enough to choke him.

Cassian stayed quiet, reeking, as he left the way he came.

Later, a spark would light the fuel and explode, killing over a dozen Imperials. He didn't see that report until years later. The Alliance let children kill, but didn't tell them they were killers until they could understand.

After that success, more of the same followed: death after death of people he didn't know but knew were bad. A poison pill here, a planted bomb there. Jobs for a child who could go unnoticed.

Each mission could've been his last.

Any moment, he would become a body in too small a coffin, if he was ever given a funeral.

…

He dreamt of the ground coming up in a wave of rock and sand and light.

Jedha, but different, still familiar. It was something that was and wasn't, an unfulfilled prophecy.

Dying alone, burning to cinders.

…

The first sensation he felt was the stiff tightness around the trunk of his body, a hollow kind of pain. He still could breathe. That was obvious. Each push and pull of air into his lungs met some resistance but not enough to start an instinctive panic.

The next sensation, the next coherent thought, was that whatever he was lying on felt too coarse on his skin.

His eyes cracked open, muted light flooding in.

An unfamiliar room. Everything was still fuzzy and out of focus, but he knew this wasn't his quarters or the med-bay on Yavin 4.

It was a dream, likely. Maybe a hallucination. Maybe he _was_ dead.

A light touch startled him into focus.

Jyn was seated next to him, the mattress dipped under her weight. A patchwork of light and shadow, real and not real.

Her fingers lightly combed through his hair, pulling wayward strands away from his face. Damp hair. Why was his hair wet?

It felt real. He wanted it to be real. But it was a hallucination. Something he wanted but couldn't have.

Cassian shifted a little, the movement taking much more effort than he predicted. A tiny grunt escaped his mouth.

Jyn's hand left his hair almost instantly and Cassian almost wept at the loss.

Her mouth moved. He was staring at her lips and that was the only way he would've known she was talking to him. His name, maybe.

He wanted to say something, but couldn't.

Cassian lifted his hand, somehow finding the strength to move.

Up, up, pointing at the woman at his side, ignoring the pain that stretched ribbon-like over his chest.

Jyn blinked, stiffened, the moment the tip of his finger touched her nose, just shy of missing. Skin-on-skin felt real, as real as the pain. He couldn't be sure.

Hallucination or not, it meant they were both existing in the same sphere at the same time.

That could be enough.

…

Cassian woke up for good to a different room and a different bed with softer sheets.

And less pain, more coherence. More things to be grateful for.

He lifted his head as best he could and glanced around, feeling delightfully alive, for his eyes to find a brunette rummaging through a pack on the ground.

"Jyn?" Cassian rasped.

She jerked like someone jabbed her with an electric poker, her eyes turning to his eyes immediately.

Something undefined, great and terrible, seemed to drift across her face, but it was gone before Cassian could think to try to identify it.

"Welcome back to the land of the living," she said.

It should've been playful. Friendly, yet dry, banter between two comrades in a war. But it sounded too strained, too frayed, on her lips. They sounded exhausted and relieved in equal measures.

Instead of acknowledging the banta in the room, Cassian grunted, looking down at himself to make sure all of his limbs were still attached.

Then he looked around the rest of the room. It was small, one bed, a table and two chairs, what Cassian could only assume was the door to the 'fresher.

"I don't remember the drapes being that ugly."

Jyn glanced at the green-grey drapes covering the windows and grinned.

"Uh, yeah. We were holed up in one motel for three days, then I moved us here. Management here's a bit more of the 'I see nothing if you pay'-type, but have terrible taste in décor."

Cassian's brain took a moment to understand what she was saying. "You moved me yourself?"

Jyn shrugged. "You're not light, Cassian, but I managed."

There was a half-eaten plate of food on the table and Cassian quickly realized he was _starving_. But barely had the energy to talk, much less eat.

"How long have I been out?" he asked.

It was something he should find out before he inevitably fell into a drug-induced fog.

Jyn's expression shuttered almost instantly, a bright light suddenly snuffed out. Guilt, sorrow, exhaustion, all muddied into one.

"Jyn?" Cassian asked. He was unable to keep the note of concern from his voice, making it crack.

She seemed to shake herself. "Bacta tank, two days. You've been in and out five days after that."

A week. That was definitely a record for Cassian. Months and years before that day he was concussed and unconscious for two days. He didn't exactly remember what had happened to cause it, but Kay had rubbed in the fact he saved him for _ages_.

The thought of Kay was like a bolt through the heart.

"Has anyone made contact?"

He didn't need to be specific for her to know what he was saying. Did the Rebel Alliance look for them? Did she try making contact?

Jyn shook her head.

"No. I was going to wait until you were strong enough."

It made sense. He knew there wasn't much Imperial presence, but there could be spies. It would've been foolish to potentially tip them off by sending a transmission with Cassian still bedridden.

"I am strong enough now."

Both of them knew it was a lie.

…

After that, he could only sleep in snatches of a couple hours at a time. Sometimes he'd wake to his mouth tasting like soup and sometimes like cotton.

Sometimes (most times) Jyn was there, sometimes she wasn't. He only caught her sleeping once. The rest of the time she was pacing, eating, taking care of him, and staring off into the distance.

It had been a day and a half. He felt stronger, and not all of it could be from the painkillers Jyn made very sure he took.

Cassian pushed his arms underneath his body in an attempt to sit up by himself. He managed to lift himself several inches without pain before Jyn noticed.

"What are you doing?"

The demand, sharp like broken glass, shocked him enough that he froze.

Cassian found words quickly. "I need to get up."

It was a simple enough thing. He needed to stand, move around. He was injured, yes. When Jyn changed his bandages, he saw the mottled bruises and the stitches where the doctors inserted tubes into him.

But he could likely stand, able to feel his fingers and toes. He was doing fine so far.

Jyn shook her head. He could see the tendon of her jaw jump as she clenched her teeth.

"You almost died Cassian. We can't be sure you won't injure yourself more if you move."

She was probably right. Of course, she was right. The smart thing for him to do was to obey and just lay back down. But, the obstinate and prideful part of him wanted to try to stand up.

Jyn dragged him around to keep him alive. He could at least _pretend_ to not be weak.

"I'm pretty sure there's little more I could do to myself."

Propped himself up a little more, chest feeling the strain. His body pivoted a little, and he gently swung one leg over the side of the bed.

"Cassian!"

Jyn lunged forward, but clearly stopped herself when Cassian's other leg joined the first and he hoisted himself up to a sitting position.

It took just about everything he had not to show the pain that rippled over his back and chest, almost knocking the wind out of his chest.

He was a spy and, therefore, good at hiding that sort of thing.

Okay, he was sitting up. And he had enough self-preservation to not actually stand. Either Jyn or his own body would knock him on his ass for trying.

Sweat beaded his temples and upper lip from the effort alone, despite whatever drugs Jyn injected in him a few hours earlier. Those would wear off eventually and he would definitely regret his pride.

Jyn looked like she was personally going to murder him. Maybe smother him with a pillow. Her jaw was tense, like she was trying to grind her teeth to powder. Her eyes were fiery anger, but too bright.

"I'm not picking you up if you fall on your face," Jyn hissed.

Seeming to dismiss him, she turned to the likely-stolen datapad on the table, fingers tapping and swiping on the screen.

Cassian watched, in a sore daze, as the unnatural light shone over her profile. She had new clothes, a loose tunic and pants. And she seemed to be without pain. A week must have been enough time for her shoulder to heal.

He watched and watched, heart feeling too big for his chest.

Gods, he wanted to kiss her.

Jyn froze instantly and whipped around to stare at him like he just grew a second head.

Cassian felt the blood drain from his face before it rushed back to color his cheeks.

Shit. He said that out loud, didn't he? Maybe he was on more drugs than he realized.

"I—um," Cassian sputtered, looking to anywhere that wasn't the woman across from him.

Well. If the gods or the Force or whatever wanted to strike him dead, there was no better time than that moment. Just let him sink into the mattress and disappear.

His ears felt too hot and his head too light as he stared down at himself and how his hands gripped the bedframe, white-knuckled.

Idiot. Drugged-out idiot who probably just ruined something that wasn't even there yet.

Cassian started almost violently when her shoes came into view and a slender finger tapped him under the chin.

He looked up, heart in his throat, expecting to see an open palm or a fist coming for his face. Instead, Cassian was treated to the sight of Jyn leaning down.

He stayed still, shock-still, Jyn's breath washing over his mouth for a moment before her lips touched his.

Cassian inhaled as softly as possible, afraid that if he breathed loud enough the illusion would break.

Jyn kissed him softly, like he would break into pieces if she pressed her mouth too hard. And really, she could have. He felt like he was dying in the best way on the inside.

Cassian tilted his head back a bit, letting Jyn deepen the kiss.

One of her hands cupped under his jaw and the other lightly rested on his shoulder. It seemed really restrained, but something told him that if he weren't injured, he would've had a lapful of Jyn.

Her lips were chapped and soft and the inside of her mouth tasted like a fruit he couldn't name. He reached up to run his fingers through the strands of hair that fell across her face.

It was perfect. It felt like the culmination of a thousand little things that finally fell into place, putting them both in that exact spot.

He had stars in his eyes. He felt lightheaded. He was…he was going to pass out.

Cassian broke the kiss with a pathetic-sounding gasp, fighting to get air back into his lungs.

"Jyn," he whispered between gulps of air.

Figures that the first kiss they shared would almost knock him out.

Jyn's eyes scanned his face, expression softer than he had ever seen it before. She was blushing and her green eyes were bright.

He wanted to kiss her again and he told her so when he could finally breathe again. He wanted to kiss her again and again.

She smiled, a tiny thing, a thing that spoke of both affection and exasperation.

"You're a real idiot, Cassian Andor," she said, punctuating the words with a kiss to the corner of his mouth. "Just so you know."

He couldn't be bothered to disagree with her.

…

 **DAMN RIGHT.**

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 **~Tiara of Sapphires**


	10. Chapter 10

**TFW school and work and life kicks you in the ass. Sorry about the wait, dears. But omg thank you all so much for the awesome feedback! I really appreciate it 3**

 **Also, please be advised of the increase in rating :D**

 **Enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars or its characters. I just like to mend my wounds with fic…**

…

He _was_ an idiot. Cassian Andor was an idiot who was going to get himself killed one of these days (not today).

But he was _her_ idiot. Obviously.

They touched more often now, stayed close to each other, like their orbits were finally allowed to cross and mingle the way they wanted to. She had tried to keep him at arm's length, before the kiss, though it felt like she was dying when she couldn't see him.

A distance still remained, as they tried to figure things out, not sure how to _have_ what they had now, not sure what to do next. It was clear neither of them was familiar with…feelings. Much less reciprocated feelings.

Cassian asked about the Rebellion, any news Jyn could find about Scarif. There was nothing to say. She didn't know and she couldn't seek answers out.

While they were out in the middle of nowhere, the threat of spies, of being tracked down, were still a constant source of worry.

Hour by hour, Cassian grew stronger. Color seeped back into his cheeks. He could eat more than a few bites of food. He could sleep more than a few fitful hours.

The relief of it all brought tears to Jyn's eyes, though she kept that hidden from him. She cried more than she wanted to admit over the course of Cassian's coma and recovery.

He still needed the medication and reapply bacta patches. The pain was still crippling when it wore off. And Jyn was nothing if not punctual with it, making sure he took every dose on the hour.

"You know, I can keep track of that too," he said, after a day passed of her reminding him.

Jyn gave him a look. So, what, she kept a fitful eye on the chrono in the corner of the room.

"I think it's best that the _uninjured_ one of the two of us keeps track of it."

Cassian looked like he was going to argue before something else seemed to catch his attention. Like a switch had been flipped, he went from argumentative to as if he had been sucker-punched.

"You were injured too," Cassian whispered. "I remember that."

Jyn nodded, shrugged.

"Yeah, I was. The clinic gave me bacta patches. It's fine now."

The wound didn't give her pain anymore, which was appreciated. They couldn't afford to have both of them unable to fight. It had been an annoyance for the most part, making it difficult for her to drag Cassian around.

She shrugged again, dismissively. It didn't almost kill her. Sure, she got lucky. But she was alive.

"I want to see it," Cassian said.

Jyn froze, a refusal forming in her mouth before she could think about it. Wild animals did not show weakness, did not show off their wounds. She was like them, in that way. Saw taught her well.

He reached out a little. His hand shook, still weak. "Please."

Jyn could not be entirely sure if he was putting on an act to get to comply. He looked deadly serious.

She had touched him more than he had touched her. It was required, as Jyn was his doctor now. Changed bacta patches, cleaned his skin. She knew his body; he didn't know hers.

It was only fair, Jyn told herself, that she would obey his wish.

Out of fairness, not the desire to be touched and held that burned through her chest.

Jyn walked over to the bed and sat next to him. He sat up a little, this time with less pain, she noted.

Her fingers fiddled with the hem of her shirt. Cassian watched her, close, not too close.

Finally, she removed her shirt, bare except for her bra.

She didn't really know what the scar looked like. From trying to look in the mirror, she figured it was hardly noticeable. A shallow divot, a couple shades lighter than her normal skin tone.

Cassian shifted and touched the scar with a gentle hand.

"I'm sorry."

Jyn shook her head.

"Nothing to apologize for. We're alive. That's what matters."

His hand smoothed over and rested on her back, warm.

"Stay?"

His voice was small, like he was ready for her to refuse him. She almost did, the urge to keep her distance, to wait it out, burning through her.

Instead, she lowered her body so she lay next to him on the bed.

"Okay."

There were many things for her to do. She needed to come up with a plan to get them off of the planet. She needed a plan to get them back to the Rebellion, if there was still a Rebellion to return to on Yavin IV.

She threw enough money at the motel's management that they wouldn't be bothered for a while. They had time but she didn't know how much.

She needed...

"Okay."

She slept for hours and when she awoke her arm was slung over Cassian's midsection and Cassian had an unbearably smug look on his face.

Past-Jyn would have been sheepish, but present-Jyn let herself relish the warmth for a moment before getting up and fixing them something to eat.

…

"Take it _slow_ , Cassian."

Cassian nodded as he put one foot in front of the other. His brow scrunched in effort and sweat collected on the top of his lip.

He was shaking, not quite like a newborn fathier, but enough that broadcasted the fact he wasn't in much shape to travel just yet. Still weak, easy prey.

Jyn was close by, though Cassian had insisted that he do this by himself and didn't need her to physically lean on.

"I've got it. I've got it," he muttered.

He was making process, but he had a look of intense concentration, like someone who let himself focus on one thing and one thing only in order to keep himself upright and conscious.

"Who would've thought that walking across a room would be such a great achievement for me?" Cassian mused.

Jyn continued to watch as he walked to the door, slowly turned around in place, and walked back to the bed.

It was not a great distance. He would barely make it out of the building's vicinity if that was the extent he was able to walk, much less run.

But Jyn kept that to herself, instead rewarded Cassian with a small grin when he sat back down on the bed and looked to her with an expectant hope.

…

Two more days passed and Jyn realized that, maybe, she was an idiot too.

It was raining outside. Thunder growled and rumbled as the rain poured down, turning the trash-filled streets into a disgusting soup.

Jyn was thankful to be inside.

Those thoughts slid between her ears as she kissed Cassian like her life depended on it, like his did as well, piling herself into his lap.

Fuck, she was so screwed. This was the sort of thing that Saw would have tried to discourage: any sort of passionate relationship, with a Rebel Alliance member of all people.

That thought disappeared as well, blown away like dust in the wind like the ghost of the man that still clung to her mind.

Cassian's mouth roamed over her neck, biting gently here and there. Jyn exhaled harshly, fisted one hand in his shirt and the other skimming under his shirt.

How did they get like this?

Jyn distantly remembered something like an argument, or, at least, an exchange of barbs. Followed by a heavy silence. Then, they crashed together, orbits crossing too close together, two planets colliding.

It was a blur from there, shedding of clothes and hasty preparation with shaking fingers.

Not enough preparation, if the thready burn when Jyn finally lowered herself onto Cassian told her anything.

She rolled her hips down, joining their bodies, and relished the moan that action punched out of Cassian's mouth.

"Good?" Jyn asked, breathless.

Cassian nodded. His eyes were glassy and his mouth was hanging open as he gasped for air.

She had to be gentle. The bruises were fading to brown and yellow, but she couldn't be sure how much of the damage remained under his skin.

As if sensing her hesitance, Cassian bucked his hips a little, restless.

"I'm not _that_ breakable, Jyn," he rasped.

She couldn't be too sure of that. It sounded like he was dying and she hadn't even started moving yet.

" _Jyn_."

Right. He was hard as a rock inside her and she was shaking above him. No time for poetics.

"Fuck," she whispered.

He wedged an arm underneath himself and pushed up to kiss her, sloppy with a hint of teeth.

"Yeah, that's kind of the idea," Cassian grumbled into her mouth.

Jyn ground her hips down against his and he flopped back down to the bed with a groan.

"What was that?" she asked sweetly, eyelids fluttering as he shifted underneath her.

"Jyn, come on. Please?"

Well, since he asked so nicely.

She rode him like their lives depended on it. Maybe, in some way, it did.

They couldn't stay in the hotel forever. The war was out there, ever-present, though the unknown of what had occurred between the battle on Scarif and that moment lingered.

This was their little enclave, a rundown room in a rundown hotel in a rundown part of town.

They didn't look like stars in those trashy porn holos. They were hollowed out, scars and sinew, bruises and bones showing just under the skin. Warriors.

The world was out there and it was going to catch up soon.

They breathed each other's air, grabbed at each other like they would disappear the moment they let go.

The rush of orgasm brought tears to Jyn's eyes and watching Cassian fall apart underneath her made her want to tuck this moment into her chest and never let go.

Nothing like the holos, but it was perfect.

They came down from it, breathing heavily, on the same grimy sheets they had rested for days now.

"We can't stay," Cassian murmured.

It was as if he had plucked the thought right out of her head.

Jyn nodded, turning to press a kiss to his shoulder. "I know."

"I _am_ strong enough to travel. In case this didn't make it clear."

He gestured between the two of them.

Jyn scoffed and lightly tapped on his stomach.

…

Stealing a ship brought a greater weight to Jyn's consciousness than she had planned.

The actual stealing of the ship was the easy part. Force knew how many ships that came into the Partisans' possession were stolen. Saw Gerrera personally taught her how to steal a ship.

She bargained and wheedled and stole. It got her in trouble but it also kept her alive. It kept her and Cassian alive.

When the day came, with what was left of their money and belongings, Jyn and Cassian snuck their way out of their room and to her mark.

It was a cargo ship, something she had seen the day before when she was casing the city, looking for transportation.

It had docked after unloading its shipment of merchandise. The owner was waiting for the next job, loitering around the shabby port on the southern part of the city.

The owner was also a sloppy drunk, making it all the easier to steal his ship.

This probably wasn't fair. Whoever owned this ship had a life, maybe a family, and maybe she was royally fucking this guy over.

But…but she was doing this out of necessity. Perhaps she could pay them back later somehow. Return to this backwater planet and repay this ship's owner, once the fighting was over and there was some sort of peace to be found.

Jyn choked down the guilt. It could be something she could wrestle with later.

The ease they had in stealing the ship Jyn chalks up to the unlucky owner ending up in a docking bay where the attendants were either drugged out on spice or didn't give a shit.

Neither Jyn nor Cassian brought that up, fearing that speaking would somehow undo their fortune. They survived their days on Otrarvis up until that point, but the last moments on this planet could turn to disaster.

It took too many precious moments for them to figure out how the controls work: a strange meld between two different styles and the Aurebesh scrawled on the metal that was meant to be a reminder to the pilot was barely legible.

Jyn's fingers tapped an uneasy rhythm on the console as the ship slowly rose into the air.

She glanced over to see that Cassian looked about as stressed as she felt, his brow furrowed.

"We're going to be okay," she said.

It sounded like a truth when it left her mouth, though it was more to reassure herself than anything else.

Cassian's face softened a little bit in response.

They flew as casually as one could in a stolen ship, the skyline getting smaller underneath them, before they escaped into the vastness of space.

Jyn tapped the coordinates with sure fingers as Otrarvis and its murky atmosphere got further and further away.

They would make two jumps: one very short jump to a nearby system, then the long jump to Yavin. It was a precaution more than anything, in case someone was tracking them. Jyn was thorough in making sure there was no tracking device stuck to the ship, but they had to be sure.

"Punch it," Cassian murmured.

The hyperdrive whirred as pinpricks of light smeared into lines.

They did it.

Cassian stood up to lean against Jyn's chair.

Before she could ask, he swooped down until his face was a breath away from hers.

Jyn made a sound that was both a question and an exclamation before Cassian's mouth sealed over hers.

A moment and a millennium passed before he pulled back, exhaling a laugh as Jyn leaned forward a bit to chase his lips.

"What was that for?" Jyn breathed.

Cassian grinned.

"A kiss for my hero," he said.

Jyn blushed, before turning back to the ship controls.

All they had to do was hope that the Rebellion wouldn't immediately try to shoot their ship out of the sky before they could attempt to make contact.

"Let's go home," Jyn whispered.

…

 **Just one more chapter and an epilogue!**

 **All feedback is appreciated as well!**

 **Cheers!**

 **~Tiara of Sapphires**


	11. Chapter 11

**Thank you so much for all the lovely hits and feedback! It is much appreciated!**

 **Also, yay, new chapter in a timely fashion!**

 **Enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars or its characters. I just like to mend my wounds with fic…**

…

"I wish Kay was here," Cassian murmured.

Jyn jerked slightly in her seat, straightening from the slumped position she had taken for the past 2 hours, and looked at him questioningly.

He shrugged again, wishing he hadn't opened his mouth.

"I do too," Jyn said.

She shrugged. "He'd probably have a clever quip to give right about now, most likely at my expense."

Cassian scoffed, "Yeah."

The cockpit got quiet again.

"I can fix him again," Cassian said. "Force knows we have his memory backed up at the base. Standard protocol after missions. We just—just need to find another Imperial security droid and plug Kay's memory into it."

He was rambling a bit, but they were moving at lightspeed towards something that may or may not still be there by the end of the jump.

Jyn seemed to catch on.

"Easy."

"Yeah. Easy. He wouldn't remember what happened on Scarif, though."

"So, he'll still think I'm an untrustworthy sack of bantha shit?"

Cassian shrugged with a grin.

"You've kept me alive in his absence. I think that would win you points with him."

Jyn shrugged. "Okay, fair enough. And I will lord that over him for the rest of my life, just so you know. But he will find some way to hate me again, I know it."

"I could program him to like you as much as I like you."

Jyn blushed at that and Cassian couldn't help but feel warm both from pride and embarrassment.

More hours passed.

Cassian had been trying to wean himself off of the medications that both mended his insides and numbed the pain. It was easier said than done, but he forced himself to administered a slightly smaller dose than the one previous.

It still hurt, like he was a walking bruise.

They talked idly about the Alliance command and Saw Gerrera's Partisans. Jyn knew many of the names, some even from before she had been captured and taken to Yavin.

"Saw took me to whatever was the Alliance headquarters at the time three times while I was part of the Partisans. I remember Saw and Alliance command always arguing about the war, about how they should do more of this or less of that."

Cassian knew he was several years older than Jyn, so she would have been a child while he was a gangly teen.

"I'm surprised I never saw you," he said. "Or that I don't remember seeing you."

"Our paths must've never crossed."

"Until they did."

He tried to imagine a world where Jyn was picked up by the Alliance, instead of Saw. A world where they grew up together.

How different would the fate of the galaxy be if that had happened?

"Until they did."

The controls beeped as they approached the end of the jump.

They both stiffened. This was it.

They dropped out of hyperspace into a field of debris and Cassian's blood turned to ice.

There were no pieces big enough to actually destroy the ship, but flecks bigger than sand tapped and glanced off of the ships viewport.

"What? What is this?" Cassian breathed.

There wasn't any obvious ship debris, either. No remnants of TIE fighters or X-wings or Y-wings. None of the fleet.

Something had happened. They didn't know what. They _couldn't_ know what.

"We should try to make contact with the surface," Jyn said, reaching for the console.

Cassian almost lurched completely out of his seat to touch her wrist. Jyn froze.

"What if it's a trap?" Cassian whispered. "What if something happened?"

Cassian breathed in, shuddering slightly. The Rebellion was everything he ever knew and now, now he didn't know what had happened to it.

Would they reach the ground and find nothing but ruin and charred bodies?

Jyn nodded, "You're right. We should head closer, shields up."

They switched seats so that Cassian was in the pilot's seat.

Fully expecting to get blown out of the sky the moment they hit the moon's atmosphere, they flew towards the base's coordinates.

They were quiet, vigilant, as they got closer.

The first thing they noticed was that the crows net was empty. The ever-present guard with binoculars had abandoned his post.

As they got closer, it was apparent that there was nobody in the base, Rebels or otherwise. None at all.

There were no ships in the hangars, no people milling around.

But, no obvious sign of a fight: no bodies, no debris.

There were still signs that the Rebellion had been there.

As they turned around for another pass, Jyn spoke up, "Should we go down there?"

"No. It's been evacuated. And if Alliance protocol has taught me anything, that base is now rigged with booby traps, in case the Empire comes snooping. We'd die within minutes of landing."

Jyn laughed, almost sounding hysterical. "Fair enough. Where do we go now? If the Alliance evacuated the base, they have to have gone somewhere, right?"

Cassian wracked his brain, possible planets and possible sets of coordinates flickering in his mind. He had turned the ship, heading back towards the edge of the moon's atmosphere.

A choice.

"Thila. Thila is our best option."

"Where's that?"

"It's remote, in the Outer Rim. Got a whole network in a mountain range on the northern hemisphere. There will at least be some people at the base. Whoever's there should be able to tell us what happened."

…

Getting immediately flanked by X-wings was something they were expecting. Cassian had never actually _been_ to the base, so he could only assume that the Alliance was escorting them to an airfield away from the actual base.

It was probably some protocol that Cassian had forgotten. At the moment, he was just worried that the staticky line of communication between their ship and the fighters would suddenly be cut off and the fighters turn on them.

"I repeat, this is Cassian Andor requesting permission to land," he said into the transceiver, making sure to enunciate every word that came out of his mouth.

"You will land when we tell you to land," came the garbled reply, not at all friendly.

He swore under his breath while Jyn seemed almost serene next to him.

"Do you think they'll believe us?"

"They haven't killed us yet."

After a few minutes of being guided in circles, they received terse instructions to land halfway up one of the smaller mountains.

He could see some artificially flat outcroppings and doors carved into the mountain face.

Jyn kissed his forehead before getting up, Cassian following close behind.

Jyn was clearly expecting the dozen blasters pointing at her chest. At this point, Cassian was as well.

"Identify yourselves!"

The two of them lifted up their hands above their heads, kept them raised, and hoped that they wouldn't be immediately shot before they could explain themselves.

Cassian breathed through the soreness that radiated from under his armpits down the length of his sides.

"Captain Cassian Andor of the Rebel Alliance," he announced, loud and clear.

"Jyn Erso of the Rebel Alliance."

Cassian glanced at Jyn, who had a ghost of a smile tugging at her mouth.

"Captain Andor was reported dead, along with Jyn Erso."

"Well, we aren't. We're telling the truth."

Fuck, they were going to shoot them.

The sergeant—Cassian didn't know his name—muttered indistinctly into a commlink on his wrist and then lowered his blaster. "Inside. I'm sure Command is going to wanna talk to you."

Cassian stepped forward, Jyn following. "Debrief?" he asked.

The man glanced at the ground and grumbled, "Something like that."

Jyn and Cassian were paraded inside. He saw familiar faces, some unfamiliar ones.

Cassian distantly heard the howling of a Wookiee. That was something new, but maybe there was a Wookiee stationed at the base.

He saw a lot of people were missing, though it seemed the majority of the Rebellion had been moved here.

Scarif, of course. But something else, surely. The Rebellion didn't throw everything at the Empire during the battle over Scarif.

Narrow passageways opened up to a cave-like room. Metal beams supported the structure and most of the floor was covered in scanners and communication devices, almost all manned.

It was like the Temple on Yavin, but there were clear signs that there was a recent uptick in activity in the base than what was normal.

Mon Mothma looked overjoyed to see them. Stars, _Draven_ almost looked happy to see them as well.

"Raised from the dead," Draven muttered, shaking his head.

"What happened? On Scarif? We transmitted the plans, or we tried to. Did the fleet get them?" Jyn asked, before anyone else had a chance to speak up.

Cassian was sure she was going to be scolded and Draven looked like he was going to, but instead Mothma cut him off: "Admiral Raddus ship received them and a small shuttle escaped with them on board. The Empire boarded the ship shortly before then. Raddus and the rest of the crew is assumed to be dead."

"The plans made it back to Yavin," Jyn breathed with a sigh of relief.

"Was anyone evacuated from the surface? Bodhi? Baze and Chirrut?" Cassian asked, dreading the response.

There was a collective hesitation, like the rest of the room had held its breath.

"You two are the only ones who made it off of Scarif."

He knew he should have expected that revelation, but it still felt like a shock.

How many were on the surface, how many rebels? Rogue One, the reinforcements.

"The entire base was destroyed by the Death Star, along with all our forces that were planetside or did not jump to hyperspace before the Imperial fleet closed in."

Rogue One, the suicide mission that killed everyone except them. Jyn and Cassian, the two de facto leaders of the mission, led dozens to slaughter.

Pure luck.

They had survived on pure luck. If they hadn't gotten on the ship, if Cassian wasn't fast enough, they would have been vaporized on Scarif.

They missed an ending that should have been theirs but wasn't.

"The Death Star was destroyed," Draven said, "Your father's trap proved to be completely accurate."

Jyn shivered a little, then stiffened with pride. Draven, in his way, almost seemed to apologize for sending Cassian to kill Galen.

Cassian couldn't help but wonder what would have changed if Cassian had pulled the trigger.

The story flowed from there, filling in the gaps: the droids, the rescue, the battle, why the base was abandoned.

It explained the presence of three people in the war room: the Wookiee and two male humans, all of whom had received honors and immediate rank advancement.

The Death Star was destroyed. The Planet-killer was not allowed to live up to its name.

"Is there anything else we should know about?" Cassian wondered.

They had a lot of thinking to do already. The hope they had held that their friends had lived through the battle and escaped had been quickly snuffed out.

There had to be something that was missed.

"Scarif was the last time the Death Star fired, right?" Jyn asked.

This garnered a similar reaction to when they asked about Bodhi and the others.

A terrible quiet.

Even Draven and Mothma looked like they didn't want to say it aloud.

Something had happened, something almost unspeakable. It had been used again, but this time, it wasn't like Jedha City or Scarif Base, it was something else.

"It was used again," Jyn said, raising her voice. "Where?"

"Alderaan was destroyed, the first and only test of the Death Star's full capabilities," a voice spoke up.

Leia Organa made her presence known and everyone looked to her. Cassian didn't know her that well, but he knew enough that when she spoke, people listened.

Her expression was slightly drawn, like she hadn't gotten a good sleep in a while.

Cassian struggled with the information. Stars, she couldn't mean…"The entire planet?" he asked.

"Yes," Leia confirmed. "It was destroyed."

Jyn swayed slightly next to him, as if the words were a physical blow. Cassian's gut clenched.

"We were too late," Jyn whispered.

…

Jyn and Cassian had to give a truncated version of what they were doing after the Battle of Scarif. The two of them 'fleeing in the middle of a battle' didn't seem to help their case, but reporting that both of them were injured at the time and disoriented kind of excused them.

They would have restricted access to the base and lose any clearance they had until Intelligence could fully vet them.

Cassian couldn't help but bristle a little at that.

While they were regarded as heroes, they were treated like recent Imperial defectors.

Jyn was near-silent, cooperating with a lack the fiery resistance Cassian was used to seeing.

He couldn't blame her. Alderaan being destroyed was a revelation that seemed to strike her to her core. He couldn't imagine what kind of guilt she was feeling.

The two of them were escorted to a single room, meant to be their quarters.

"You'll have to share a bed or one of you can request a sleeping mat and an extra blanket," the quartermaster grumbled, already turning to head back to the labyrinth of hallways.

Cassian thought about making a quip about that, or nudging Jyn to see if they could share the joke that, indeed, they would have no problem with sharing the bed.

But she stared forward, nodding quietly in acknowledgement.

The quartermaster punched in the room key and left without another word.

Jyn stepped forward into the room and stopped in the doorway with slumped shoulders.

"We shouldn't have made it. An entire planet, gone."

Her voice was small and splintered like ice. Like a bereft child, who just had her parent ripped from her.

Cassian stepped closer to her, reaching out to rest his hand on her shoulder. His thumb rubbed little circles. He could feel her shaking, just a little.

"They did not die in vain," he whispered. "You did it, my love. You did it."

He believed that. It was the truth. No matter how much guilt the two of them would carry, likely for the rest of their lives, it was that they did their jobs. There was only so much they could do.

Jyn remained unmoved for a long time, before finally she nodded and her posture softened.

She was tired, likely traumatized by the revelations, by the relief. He was as well.

They would have their time to recover and mourn.

But, the war still needed to be won.

"We did it…my love," she replied, echoing the pet name. It sounded good. Right.

Yeah, they did.

…

 **We just have the epilogue after this!**

 **All feedback is appreciated!**

 **Cheers!**

 **~Tiara of Sapphires**


	12. Epilogue

**And here we are, the epilogue. Thank you so much to each one of you who read, who commented and kudos and favorited and followed and all that good stuff.**

 **Enjoy!**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars or its characters. I just like to mend my wounds with fic…**

…

A young girl weaved her way through the crowded marketplace.

She liked to insist that her 10 years was considered not as young as everyone else says. It granted her some sort of independence, though her father insisted that she keep a com-link and a little knife with her every time she left the house without her parents.

Going to the marketplace was not one of those privileges. Her mother was nearby, haggling with the keeper of the fruit stand.

"Stay close, Liia," her mother exclaimed over her shoulder.

Liia let herself wander just enough that her mother could see her and that she was able to look at the wares of her favorite stand.

Her parents gave her everything she needed, but never let her become spoiled.

She helped her mother with the garden and her father with cleaning the speeder and making sure Kay's joints didn't rust. Usually her work earned her an extra 30 minutes before bed to watch her favorite drama holo, but sometimes she would get a credit to put in the little pouch she kept under her bed.

8 credits burned a hole in her pocket as she looked at the beads and stones that shone under the morning sun.

10 years meant she was tall enough to look at the jewelry without one of her parents hoisting her up.

Every color imaginable covered the table, but one thing caught Liia's eye.

A white crystal, a little longer than her longest finger, shaped like a root from the garden. It lacked all other ornaments that the other pieces of jewelry had, one end simply wrapped around with a piece of twine, making it look plain and boring.

She _loved_ it.

"See something, kid?" the shopkeeper, an old Twi'lek, gruffed.

Liia started a bit and pointed at the rock in the box.

"I want that one."

The man sniffed. The thing had fallen into his possession years ago but nobody bothered buying it. He had considered even scrapping it a few times, but merchandise was merchandise.

And, finally, he was going to make a profit from this little girl who wanted _this_ of all things.

"10 credits," he said.

She pulled out her money from her pocket and looked down at her fist.

"I only have 8."

The shopkeeper looked at the piece in the box and back at the little girl, who looked utterly bereft at the idea of leaving without the rock. But, this was the first person to show interest in it.

Did he _really_ want to lug it back home once the market closed?

Also, the kid looked like she was about to burst into tears and stars help him if a little girl started sobbing right in front of his stall. He dealt with enough of that at home.

"Alright, I'll take 8, kid."

Immediately, she brightened.

"Thank you!" she exclaimed, all but throwing the money at him before taking the box, tucking it into her pocket, and running off to rejoin her mother.

The storekeeper caught a glimpse of the mother's face and shook his head.

Figures _she_ would be the kid's mother.

…

Later that night, Liia sat in bed, cradling her new necklace in her hands.

"Liia, what are you looking at?"

Her mother had peeked into her doorway to see Liia hunched over something she couldn't see. Liia looked up with a grin.

"I got something at the marketplace, with the money you and Papa give me sometimes," Liia said.

"Oh? Let's see it, then."

Her mother walked over to her bedside and Liia lifted up the necklace in her hands.

"Look! It was 8 credits and now it's my favorite thing!"

Her mother's eyes suddenly became very bright and shiny and she couldn't help but panic a little. Mama hardly ever cried.

"Is it…bad?" Liia asked, dropping the necklace into her lap like it had burned her hands. "I can give it back to the man tomorrow, I promise!"

The older woman shook her head before sitting on her daughter's bed.

Liia looked up at her face.

Her mother smiled, less tears now, and lifted the necklace into her own hands.

"Little one, I have a story for you. It's about how your father and I met."

…

 **Nice happy ending to wrap things up. Cassian and Jyn might be dead in the Star Wars canon, but they are alive in our hearts.**

 **Thank you all so much for following this story!**

 **Cheers and God bless,**

 **~Tiara of Sapphires**


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